


This will end in flames

by rndbmnsay



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, bad boy keith, lance think he's straight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-31
Updated: 2017-11-07
Packaged: 2018-12-22 06:24:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 28,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11961579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rndbmnsay/pseuds/rndbmnsay
Summary: Hunk met his soulmate a few months ago when he was buying some groceries. And how he knew she was the one? Because Hunk has his mark on his hand like a fricking normal person. And where do I have it? In my fricking back. How am I supposed to find my soulmate having the mark on my back? And an addition to my misery; Keith, this guy who enjoys making my life a living hell, especially when he claims to know who my soulmate is and won't tell me.Or: Keith finds out Lance's his soulmate but Lance believes he's straight and Keith won't say a thing until he proves Lance is so fucking gay for him.





	1. The flame

**Author's Note:**

> So, you'll see my chapters are short, but that means I will post more often. And idk, enjoy!

Hunk met his soulmate a few months ago when he was buying some groceries. And how he knew she was the one? Because Hunk has his mark on his hand like a fricking normal person. And where do I have it? In my fricking back. How am I supposed to find my soulmate having the mark on my back? I can't just go lifting up girls’ shirts to see their backs, believe me; I can't, the slapping it's not worth the disappointment of not seeing the flame on a girl’s back. And apparently I can't just walk around shirtless so girls can see my flame shaped mark, I've been told it's not ethnic. But I believe today's the day, today they're opening the campus’ pool, and Allura will be there, and she'll take off her shirt, and I will see the exact same mark I have on my back, and we'll be happily ever after. How do I know she'll have it? Because I never saw her mark in any visible place and she's the most beautiful girl in the place, it just makes sense she's my soulmate.

 

“Lance!” The sudden voice of Coran, my astronomy professor, distracted me from my thoughts. “Lance, are you listening?” I quickly nodded, and he raised one eyebrow. “What was I saying then?” Fuck. “Um… that Pluto is no longer a planet?” Coran sighed. “Lance, pay attention, you're a good student, I don't want to give you suspension.” “Sorry, sir. It won’t happen again.”

 

As soon as the class ended, I ran towards my room, crashing onto Keith in my way. He almost fell and the glare he gave me felt like he could end me right now. “Don't you fucking see where you're going, four eyes?” Today I woke up late and there was no time to put my lenses on, so I had to wear my glasses, curse my laziness. “Um, I'm sorry, I-” Keith suddenly grabbed my glasses. “Hey! Give that back!” I tried to take them back, but he pushed me away. “You should have thought it twice before stepping on my way.” “It wasn't on purpose!” Keith didn't answer and just walked away with my glasses. Fucking prick, I still don't get why he hates me so much, I didn't do anything to him! And now everything was a blur, but I still managed to make it to my dorm.

 

As soon as I got there, I took my spare glasses and then searched for my trunks. I picked my favorite pair, blue with white details on the left side. I changed myself and looked in the mirror. Looking good. I put on a shirt, grabbed a towel and went outside to meet Hunk.

 

He was already there, waiting and smiling. When I got near him, he pulled me into a hug, like he always does. Then we started to walk towards the pool. “Are you excited?” Hunk asked me. “Sure I am. I just can't wait for Allura to discover I am his soulmate.” Hunk looked at me with concern in his eyes. “What are you going to do if she's not the one?” I haven't even thought of that; I'm sure she's my soulmate. “Don't worry; she'll be.” Hunk sighed and looked disappointed, but didn't add anything more.

 

As I had guessed, Allura was already there; she was swimming so I couldn't see her back clearly. Suddenly her eyes were on me. I took advantage of the situation and turned my back to her as I took off my shirt. When I turned around to face her, she was walking out of the pool, straight towards me. Oh my God. It's happening. She saw the mark, and she's coming to tell me we're soulmates, I obviously couldn't see her back, but why would she be approaching me then?

 

“Are you okay, Lance?” Okay, that wasn't exactly what I was expecting. “How could I not be with this beauty right in front of me?” She didn't seem to react to my compliment. “I was just asking because I saw what happened earlier with Keith.” Oh. “I told the principal, so I'm sure he'll give you your glasses back.” Beautiful and nice, what more could I ask for? “Oh. Thank you, Allura.” She smiled brightly, and I swear I could just melt right in front of her. “By the way have you seen my awesome mark?” I turned around to show it to her hoping she’d say something now. “Oh, it's so cool! It looks like a flame!” I turned to look at her, and suddenly she was the one showing me her back. “Mine looks like a flower!” I stared at her, not knowing how to react. It was true, on her back, right between her shoulder blades lied a perfect drawn flower on her skin. She faced me again. “I'm glad I'm not the only one struggling with their marks on their back, it's so difficult finding my soulmate like this.” I simply nodded. “Well, I'm glad you're okay, Lance.” She waved at me and walked away. This couldn't be happening; she should have been the one.

 

I suddenly felt a hand on my shoulder; I looked up to see Hunk. “I'm sorry bud, you knew this could happen.” I nodded and tried to bring my smile back. “But do you know what this means, Hunk?” I smirked. “That my soulmate will be even greater than Allura, I can't wait to meet whoever she is.” Hunk chuckled. “By the way, I think Keith wants to give you your glasses back. He's outside and won't stop staring at you; it's creeping me out.” I turned around, and yes, Keith was there, looking at me from the distance with my glasses on his hand. The weird thing is that he didn't seem angry, he appeared to be staring at me in shock, why? I sighed and walked over to him.

 

“Did you come to bring my glasses back?” He didn't say a thing or tried handing me the glasses; he just kept staring at me. “Hello?” Keith shook his head and handed me my glasses, but the weird look won't leave his face. “Um… is something wrong?” Keith raised an eyebrow. “I was just surprised you have a mark; I thought someone as stupid as you wasn't worth a soulmate.” I glared at him; I didn't know what I was expecting. “Well, maybe you are the one not worth a soulmate, I don't see any mark on your skin.” He stayed silent for a moment. “It's on my back.” Yeah, sure what a coincidence, I bet he doesn't have one. “Really? Show me then.” He did not move. “It's not for you to see.” Ugh. I hate him so fucking much. “I understand. You're embarrassed yours isn't as cool as mine because the girl with this flame will be the very best.” Keith didn't seem to care for my words. “How are you so sure it's a girl?” The fuck is he implying. “I'm not gay; I'm straight, I'm attracted to girls.” Keith smirked at that. “Right.” If he wasn't stronger than me, I swear I would punch that grin away from his face. “I'm telling you I'm not gay, what the fuck? Maybe you're the gay one!” He seemed unimpressed. “Yes, I am. Got a problem with that, four eyes?” Okay. I wasn't expecting that, but I couldn't care less about this idiot's sexuality. At my lack of response, he spoke again. “That's what I thought.” And then he just left.

 

When I finish spending almost the rest of the day swimming, I waved goodbye to Hunk and walked towards my room, which I wish it were closer to Hunk, but no, Keith had to be the one in the room next to mine. Once he spent all night kicking the wall a couple of times every hour so I wouldn’t sleep, I swear that guy is the embodiment of evil. It was no surprise Keith arrived there at the same time as me. I always forget he finishes his training by now. So there he came, all sweaty and with his mullet tied up in a ponytail. Disgusting.

 

I walked to the elevator and pressed the button, just because he always chooses the stairs, not because I’m lazy, of course not. But then, Keith stopped right next to me, and then he stretched his arms and moved his head in circles making his neck crack as the few strands of hair that didn’t make it into the ponytail fell onto his face, sticking to it due to the sweat. He then parted his legs and moved his body down popping up his butt up, and I fucking looked at his butt, what the heck, Lance?! “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I asked trying not sound as horrified as I felt. Keith looked up at me and smirked. “Stretching.” He moved his body up to a regular position as a satisfied grin adorned his face. “Why? Did I make you flustered?” “No! It’s just... This isn’t the place for doing that thing, you’re sweaty, and it’s gross!” That made him smile even more, but it wasn’t the typical smile, it was evil, he was up to something. The elevator’s doors opened, and we both entered. I pressed the button to the third floor, and Keith leaned against the wall. He grabbed the collar of his shirt and started moving his hand to fan himself as the same time as exposing a bit his naked chest, jerking his head back and closing his eyes. I didn’t know what he was up to, but I didn’t like it. “Why are you here?” I asked with a tone that gave away how annoyed I was. Keith stopped moving and looked at me raising an eyebrow. “What do you mean?” “In the elevator! You always choose the stairs!” Keith gave me that odd smile again. “How do you know I always choose the stairs?” I couldn’t help a groan escaping my throat, I mean I only knew that because I have to keep an eye on him to avoid him, a thing in which I’m currently failing. 

 

The elevator’s doors opened again as Keith let his hair loose and ruffled it a bit. Then he tilted his head and looked at me. “I’ve seen your mark.” I don’t like his tone. “No shit.” “I mean, before today.” He’s lying; there’s no way he could have seen my back before. “No, you haven’t.” That strange smile grew wider. “I have. Just not on you.” What. “Do you know who my soulmate is?” “Yup.” He’s lying; he’s just messing with me. But... what if he’s not? “Who?” “I won’t tell you until I prove something.” Have I ever mentioned this guy is the embodiment of evil? “Prove what?! Just tell me!” Keith shook his head. “Not until I prove it, Lance.” He was getting on my nerves. “Prove what?!” My angry tone seemed to please him. “You’ll know. Now just shut up and go  _ straight _ to your room.” He pronounced the word  _ straight  _ slower, and in a different tone from the rest of the sentence, I didn’t understand why he did that, but I didn’t like it. Before I could protest more, he entered his room without saying a word. With a groan, I came into my room and crashed on the bed. Fucking Keith.


	2. Keith's evil plan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Omg, I didn't expect that many people to read the first chapter and reading those four comments really made my day, thank you all so much, I'm so happy you all liked it, and I hope you keep reading and enjoying it. Thank you so much again ❤

“I'm telling you Hunk; he's up to something. Something bad.” Hunk and I were now in the classroom, though the lesson hadn't started yet and the room was slowly filling up with students. “Okay, I admit that not telling you who your soulmate is isn't very nice of him but I don't get how the fact that he was stretching next to you fits in all of this.” I frowned, I thought Hunk of all people would understand. “It was evil!” Hunk raised an eyebrow. “How can stretching be evil? Was he eating a rat or something while doing it?” “No! He was stretching!” Hunk blinked. “I still can't see it.” I went over through my memories again, and I could tell something was off yesterday but I couldn't quite explain what. “I just got this weird feeling you know? I knew it was no good.” Hunk sighed. “You're not making sense, Lance.” Right at that moment, Keith entered the classroom, and I looked at him. We locked eyes, and as he stared at me, he smirked. I quickly turned to Hunk. “Did you see that?! He's definitely plotting something!” Hunk looked confused. “See what?” I let out a groan. How could I convince him that Keith had an evil plan? I decided to study Keith's movements. Instead of going to his seat, he walked over to Coran’s desk. Weird. Keith never bothers in talking to teachers. He seemed to be explaining or asking something to the professor. Coran listened patiently, and when he was finished, he nodded and seemed happy with what Keith just said, I wonder what it was. He then turned around and looked at me; he seemed pleased to catch me staring. He then walked towards his seat with a satisfied grin on his face and sat down.

 

Coran finally stood up and asked for the class’ attention. “As you know, today I'm assigning your partners for the project I've been talking about this last week…” I'm sure Coran is going to pair me up with Hunk. He knows we are best friends and he loves us both. “... And I've been thinking to pair you all up with someone you aren't used to; I want to improve communication in this class.” Okay, I don't like the sound of that. He began listing pairs; tension was building up inside of me. “Lance and…” Please don't say Keith. Please don't say Keith. “... Keith.” I quickly raised my hand to protest. “Yes, Lance?” “I want a different partner.” Coran looked at me disappointed. “No, Lance, this is for you to bond with different people other than your friends. Besides, Keith really wants to do this project with you, he personally asked me for this. I'm sure you two will do great.” I noticed Keith staring at me with that odd smile from yesterday drawn on his face. “I told you, Hunk. I fucking told you he is up to something. I'm sure he's planning on killing me.” Hunk shook his head. “I don't think Keith could get away with murder.” “You don't know that.” My assumption seemed to entertain Hunk. Didn't he see this was serious? My life was probably on the line! I couldn't focus for the rest of the class with how anxious I was.

 

When the class ended, I stood up and saw Keith approaching me, at least now Hunk was with me to protect me. “You come later to my room to prepare the project.” Me? In Keith’s room? Alone? Nope. “Not going to happen.” Keith rolled his eyes. “I’ll go to your room then.” He’s not getting it. I don’t want to be alone with him. I’m not going to let happen whatever evil thing he’s got in mind. “We’ll go to the library. A public place.” Keith’s lips curled up a bit. “I guess you discovered my plan to murder you.” I turned to Hunk. “See?! I told you!” Hunk simply sighed, he seemed disappointed. Why won't he believe me? I mean, okay, Keith’s probably not trying to kill me, but I could tell he’s plotting something against me. “See you at the library then.” Keith said and left.

 

Hours later I was chilling in my room just listening to some music, enjoying life when suddenly the bells of hell rang through my ears, in other words, Keith knocked at the door. I opened the door to see him standing there, he said nothing and me neither, I just stepped out, closed the door behind me and started walking out of the dorms to the library. He followed in silence. I eyed him a couple of times on our way and every single time he caught me and the fucker seemed pretty pleased with it, apart from that, nothing else weird, I think.

 

We arrived at the library and walked straight to the computers because let’s be real; we weren’t going to spend so much time reading books when we were just a google search away from information. Keith decided to do all the research; I simply copied down on a paper all he said that seemed necessary, maybe it wasn’t that bad doing the project with Keith after all, Hunk always makes me work. Just when I was starting not to feel uncomfortable with this situation, Keith broke the silence. “So, what are you doing here?” What does that even mean? “Writing on a paper?” Keith rolled his eyes. Geez, excuse me for your bad communication skills. “I mean, in astronomy class.” Oh. “I don’t know. There’s not really a reason.” Keith looked confused, even offended I’d say. “What do you mean you don’t have a reason?” “I don’t know, man. I didn’t know what to do with my life, so I just did what I was told.” Keith’s expression turned into something I’ve never seen before on him, was it pity? “Do you want to know my reason?” Before I could even answer, he stood up and started walking. And I didn’t really know why, but I followed him.

 

We reached his room, and he opened the door. I glanced inside; no walls painted black, no taxidermied black cat, no dark magic books, not even weapons, it was an average room just like mine. “I said I’m not going into your room.” I stated as I stayed right on the door without placing a single foot in there. He ignored and opened his closet taking out two helmets, then walked towards me and handed me one. “Why?” Keith extended his hand towards me with his index finger on front and placed it on my lips sending shivers down my spine, and my eyes opened wide, and he might have noticed because he smirked looking right into my eyes. “Sh, follow me.” His finger was on me for barely a second and his finger was as cold as my favorite ice cream in summer, but my lips burned at his touch, and the warmth remained there long after he moved his hand away. And I swear he had some venom, drug or something weird in his fingertips because I felt drawn to follow him without stopping to think about it.

 

Keith stopped in the campus parking lot right in front of a red, kinda old motorbike. He hopped on it and looked at me waiting for me to do the same. “I’m not going on there with you; you’d probably crash the bike to kill me.” He chuckled a bit. “I wouldn’t give my own life just to kill you; you’re not that special, Lance.” I think that was the first time I heard him say my name. “Besides, I know exactly how I’ll kill you.” I raised an eyebrow. “I’ll light you on fire; you’ll feel  _ the flame _ s.” Why did I follow him again? “If you’re trying to get me on the bike saying those things, let me tell you is not working. Besides, it’s really late now.” “Oh, I see what’s going on, you’re afraid of motorbikes, should have guessed sooner.” What. “I’m not scared!” He slowly started to get off the bike but I quickly jumped right behind him. “Bring it on!” He smirked and put his helmet on and so did I. “Hang on to me.” “I’m not touching you.” Without warning, he started the bike and my arms automatically wrapped around him. I couldn’t see his face, but I bet he was smirking.

 

We rode for like fifteen minutes in absolute silence, the only thing I heard was the roar of the motor and the wind hitting us due to the speed. And I guessed I could have frozen right there with how cold the wind got with how fast Keith was driving and with the fact that I was wearing short sleeves. But my arms around Keith’s body felt like sitting in front of the fireplace back at home during winter, watching the flames dance with all my family around. 

 

He finally stopped driving to park at the bottom of a hill in the middle of nowhere. He instantly got off the bike and started walking away without saying a word. Probably because he knew I’d follow him, I’m not that stupid to stay next to an empty road when it is dark. 

 

We arrived at the top of the hill, and from there you could see the whole city and if you looked up thousands of stars will greet your face. I looked at Keith and to my surprise, he wasn’t staring at me, he was staring at the sky. And I could just see how all the stars above mirrored in his eyes, for a moment I doubted if his eyes were the ones projecting the stars onto the sky. “Are you going to pull the cliché of romantic movies and explain to me how beautiful space is?” That grabbed his attention, and his gaze was now focused on me, and the odd smile made his way back to his face. “You think being here with me is romantic?” Once again he seemed pleased with the horrified expression that reached my face. “No! Absolutely not! I was just saying that you seem to be copying one of those movies!” The expression on his face didn’t change at all. “So you think I’m being romantic with you.” “Fuck no! Gross!” That seemed to make his evil grin grew even wider. “Do you want me to tell you then?” For some reason, I found myself interested in what he had to say, so I nodded. “Oh, so you want to know about me?” There it was again, that weird tone giving away he was up to no good. “And you want to tell me about you.” He blinked and seemed legitimately surprised, I bet he wasn’t expecting that. Eat it, mullet! “Do you know that thing they say, that when people die, they become space dust or even stars?” I nodded slightly confused. “Well, that’s the reason I want to travel to space some day.” “To see… dead people?” He slowly nodded. “To finally meet my family.” The fuck. “What are you talk-” I stopped speaking when I realized what he meant. I stayed quiet for a couple of minutes thinking of what to say next. “But you have your soulmate, are you going to give her up to go to space?” “Him.” Keith corrected. “And no, he’ll come to space with me.” “Have you met her? I mean, him.” Keith nodded. “You know, this would be a great moment to tell me who my soulmate is.” He shook his head. “Nope. Good try though.” “Come on! At least tell me if she’s pretty!” Suddenly Keith was getting closer to me, and I felt his breath in my ear, and I could swear my chest was on fire when he whispered. “I’m not telling you yet.” Then he backed away and started walking towards his motorbike. I hate him. I fucking hate him. 


	3. Heat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for your comments ❤❤ I'm so happy that so many people are enjoying this, like really wow thank you so much

I was peacefully sleeping when a loud noise woke me up. My bed was so comfy right now, that I could stay here forever since there's no class today, so I swear if that noise was Keith kicking the wall again I-. Again. It was knocking at my door, not on my wall. “Go away; I'm sleeping!” And they knocked again. I stood up with a groan and rubbed my eyes as I opened the door. It was Hunk. “Were you really still asleep?” I nodded. “Why wouldn't I? There's no class; I can oversleep.” “Yeah but it's lunch time already.” Oh. “So, there's this new pizzeria right next to the campus and Pidge and I are going to check it out. Want to come?” “Pizza and my two dear friends? Sign me up!” Hunk chuckled and waited for me to get changed.

 

“Are you seriously telling me you went on a date with the one guy you hate?” This is Pidge, as you can see she's a little shit but she's my friend, and I'm obliged to love her. “It was not a date, what the fuck, Pidge?!” Pidge shrugged. “He took you for a ride on his bike to show you the stars, sounds like a date to me.” Why is she doing this to me? I poured my feelings out about how Keith is definitely plotting something against me, and Pidge makes fun of me. I can’t believe this. “Not when is motherfucking Keith who takes me there!” “Guys, don’t fight in front of the pizzas, please.” Hunk pointed to the pizzas that I haven’t even tried yet. “Besides, I think that Keith just wants to be your friend, from what you said he didn’t do anything bad.” “Everything about yesterday was evil!” Pidge shook his head. “They can’t be friends, Hunk.” Finally, she’s making sense. “Because I already ship them.” I stood up slamming my hands on the table. “Katie Holt!” “Using my name and surname? What are you? My dad?” Hunk sighed and pulled me down back to my chair. “Can we drop this? The whole place is staring at us.”

 

Half a pizza later the door swung open and guess who walks in. That’s right; Keith. I should have expected this, the place is right next to the campus. I shrunk a little in my seat like when teachers want to call someone to the board, hoping Keith doesn’t notice me. And he doesn’t even look my way. Point for Lance, baby. “Look at him, staring at his boyfriend, so cute.” I turned around to glare at Pidge and Hunk was giving me that look that says ‘please be calm, don’t start anything now.’ So instead of answering Pidge, I just tried my best not to stare at Keith so she couldn’t say anything more and I don’t get why was it so difficult. 

 

But I succeeded or was succeeding until Pidge, who was unfriended and blocked in an instant yelled at him. “Yo, Keith! Why buy a slice?! Eat a whole pizza like a fucking man!” I turned around horrified, and Keith was staring at her more confused than angry. “Do I even know you?” Pidge smiled widely. “Nope. But Lance here talks a lot about you.” Can someone remind me why I consider Pidge a friend? Keith looked at me and smirked, pretty pleased with what he just heard. “Oh really, Lance?” I glared at him and then I noticed. His pizza. He had bought a slice of pineapple pizza. “What’s wrong with you?!” “Apparently nothing since you talk about me so much.” I ignored his comment and pointed at his pizza. “What?” “Pineapple. In your pizza. Why?!” Keith tilted his head. “Why not?” “Because it’s wrong! Don’t you have that voice that tells you ‘No, Keith, don’t do that, it’s not right.’” “Shiro isn’t here right now.” What. “Who the heck is Shiro?” “What are we even talking about?” I blinked in confusion. Keith blinked too. Pidge laughed, and Hunk remained silent. “Alright, I’m just going to leave now. Don’t miss me much, four eyes.” I think my name is not that difficult to say, what the fuck. “I’m not even wearing glasses now!” Keith just shrugged.

 

“Wait, don’t leave, eat with us, I’m sure Lance would really appreciate it.” That’s it. I’m killing Pidge. Keith chuckled. “Thank you for the offer. But I’m saving this.” He raised his slice of pizza. “For when I finish training.” Eat it, Pidge. “Oh. Take Lance with you! He needs to exercise, he might seem fit, but he’s a couch potato.” Right when I thought Pidge couldn’t say anything worse. “Alright, since you just ate, I’ll pick you up in two hours.” Absolutely not. “I’m not going.” “Put some comfy clothes on; I’ll go easy on you.” “Are you even listening to me?!” The idiot said nothing more and just left. I glared at Pidge and she smiled at me. “You’re welcome.” “I’m going to murder you.”

 

I was in my room looking through my closet. What were comfy clothes for Keith? I hope sweatpants and a sleeveless shirt does it. I changed my clothes and looked at myself in the mirror. Man, I sure look good in everything. I glanced at the clock as I sat on my bed, Keith should be here any minute now. I don’t even know why I agreed on this. Well, technically I didn’t agree on this. I can just not go. I’m my own man, and I can do what I want. The sudden knocking on my door distracted me from my thoughts.

 

With a groan, I stood up and opened the door. As soon as I saw Keith, I swear if I were drinking something I would have spilled it all over him. The guy was wearing a fricking crop top. I felt my face heat up for some reason as I looked down at his exposed skin. His abs were so defined that if you put a paper on it and rolled a crayon over it, you would have a copy of them. “My face is up here.” Oh shit, I was staring. I looked up at him. The heat I was feeling won’t leave my face, and my voice wouldn’t come out. Why was my body acting so weird?! Keith smirked. “Why so flustered, Lance?” Why did he have to say my name right now? It didn’t feel okay, and the fucker looked so proud of himself. I glared at him and said nothing. Because, yes, I’ll admit it, he was right, and I was flustered. But I couldn’t answer his question. This kind of things doesn't happen looking at boys! Even less looking at Keith. What’s wrong with you, body? “Come on, let’s go.”

 

We headed outside and stopped in front of the building. “Since you aren’t used to exercising I am going to take you running.” Okay, I think I can handle this, I ran after busses all the time. “But you need to stretch first.” Flashbacks to the other day flooded my mind. This was not a good idea. “Alright, first bring your arms up over your head and, keep your abdominals tight.” He did so himself to show me how to position myself. “Now lean to the right and then to the left, bending at the waist.” He began moving as he said and so did I. “I feel stupid.” He ignored me. We kept doing that for a couple of minutes until Keith stopped. “Good, now move your hands to your hips and place your feet hip-width apart, like this.” He did as he said and once again I copied him. “Now circle your hips in one direction like if you were hula-hooping.” That was simple enough. “Make the circles wider and wider with every rotation.” I was about to point out that I still felt stupid, but when I looked at him, I noticed as his hips moved as it was such a normal movement for him and how smooth the circles were. I also noticed how my eyes stuck on where his red boxers showed up a bit from inside his pants. Then he suddenly stopped moving with a rap that felt like he was physically hitting me with his hips. “Switch direction.” His voice snapped me out of my trance, and I did as he said.

 

After a couple more exercises he decided we were ready to go for the run and he put his hair up in a ponytail. He should wear his hair like this more often; it suits him. I mean, at least is better than seeing his stupid mullet. “Ready?” I nodded. “Okay. Just keep up with my running pace and don’t go too fast, that way you’ll last longer.” “Isn’t the point of running going fast?” Keith rolled his eyes and started moving. I followed him, running or moving fast because that was what he was doing, right next to him. I stared at him, his gaze was focused on the floor with that determined look of him, and his ponytail bounced against his neck with every step he took. I wonder if that was ticklish. “So, are you taking me somewhere or are we running freely?” He turned his head towards me with a bored look on his face. “No talking while running.” He then moved his eyes away from me. It’s not like I’m dying to talk with him but this shit is too boring and if he’s just going to ignore why am I even here.

 

Ten minutes later in complete silence, I had enough. “Let’s race.” Keith didn’t even bother to look at me. “I said not going fast.” Party pooper. “I’m going to sprint.” Once again he didn’t even look at me. “I said no.” I mentally prepared myself and started running as fast as I could. Then I heard Keith’s angry voice behind my back. “Lance! Stop!” I didn’t stop. Moments later I heard quick footsteps approaching me. I did it; I made Keith run. I slightly looked back without stopping and saw as he was quickly gaining on me. Nope, I’m not letting him win me. I tried my hardest to run faster but the guy was good, he’ll catch me any minute now.

 

And he did. He grabbed me by the shoulder in an attempt to make me stop, but the only thing he managed was making me trip on my feet. The idiot didn’t let go of me, so we both ended up falling. Right before hitting the ground, Keith wrapped an arm around me making me flip, and he hit the floor taking the impact for both of us. I looked down at him as he was staring at me, not angry, but with a soft look that I never saw and never thought I would see on him. In addition to that weird face, his arm was still around me, and I felt my face heating up the second time today. I quickly pushed him away and stood up. He slowly sat up on the floor and rubbed his back, a slight of pain on his eyes. I usually would have apologized, but there was something bugging me. “You took the fall for me.” Keith sighed and stood up. “Let’s end this now; I need a shower.” 

  
We made our way in silence back to the building, and for some reason now the silence was comfortable. But when we exited the elevator, and I looked at his back; I noticed. “Keith, you have dried blood on the back of your shirt.” He looked at me unimpressed. “Yeah, I noticed that.” I got closer to him to lift up his shirt. “Let me see; you wouldn’t even know how many times I healed my nephews' wounds, I’m practically an expert now.” But just before I could touch him he turned around and slapped my hand. “Dude, what’s wrong with you? I’m just trying to help; it’s the least I can do.” “Don’t try to do that ever again.” I seriously can’t understand this guy, right when I thought Hunk could be right. “You’re bleeding, and it was my fault, just let me help.” He moved near the wall probably just in case I tried to look at his back again. “I don’t care how much you want to see me shirtless; you won’t.” I opened my eyes widely. “That’s not it, you stupid prick!” Keith smirked. “Of course not. That’s why you wouldn’t stop staring at me earlier.” “But you were making me stare on purpose!” You should see how fucking proud of himself he looked right now. “Really? And what was I doing to achieve that?” I thought for a moment and frowned. I couldn’t tell what made me stare at him earlier, but I knew he must have been doing something. “Well, heal yourself, idiot.” I said and walked away to my room.


	4. Keith's soulmate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for your comments! It makes me really happy knowing so many people are enjoying this ❤

I was once again sleeping in when, again, someone knocked at my door. It was probably Hunk, he always finds plans for our days off, but I really needed the extra sleep right now, so I stayed silent hoping he went away, sorry Hunk. He knocked again. I glanced at the clock, ten and three minutes, oh god why so soon. “Huuunk! Let me sleep, please!” Then I heard footsteps walk away. I felt bad; I’ll call him later to apologize. I hugged one of my pillows and moved the other one closer so it was touching my back. I can’t sleep if I am not imprisoned by two pillows, I guess feeling something on both sides of my body makes me feel less alone. I’m used to living in a house full of people, and when my sister brought her children they loved to play with me and most of the nights assaulted my bed, no one beats best tío Lance. I smiled to myself and closed my eyes again. I soon fell asleep.

 

_We made our way in silence back to the building, and for some reason now the silence was comfortable. But when we exited the elevator, and I looked at his back; I noticed. “Keith, you have dried blood on the back of your shirt.” He looked at me unimpressed. “Yeah, I noticed that.” I got closer to him to lift up his shirt. “Let me see; you wouldn’t even know how many times I healed my nephews' wounds, I’m practically an expert now.” I heard him gasp as soon as my hand made contact with his skin. I slowly lift up his shirt careful not to hurt him more than he already was, but when I got full visual to his back, I completely forgot I was looking for a wound. There it was, a little perfectly drawn flame on Keith’s back, just like mine. My body froze, and I couldn’t do anything more than stare in silence. I felt Keith slowly move away and turn to look at me; I recognized in his face the same expression I saw when I accidentally pinned him to the ground when we fell earlier. I didn’t say anything, his lips didn’t move either. Instead, it was his hand that reached mine and pulled me into his room and close to him. Then his hand left mine and grabbed both of my shoulders, turning me around, so I was walking backwards into his room. His soft stare was replaced by that characteristic smirk of his, and he pushed me towards his bed making me lose my balance. I closed my eyes as I felt the impact towards the grass. When I opened my eyes, I was greeted with the night sky and thousands of stars. I slowly sat up to find Keith sitting in front of me, staring at me with a curious look. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, but I didn’t hear myself speak. Keith tilted his head like he didn’t understand what I said. “Do you want to go to space with me?” Keith asked completely ignoring my question, and for some reason, I nodded. He lifted up his arms and moved them towards me, cupping my cheeks with both hands, pulling my face closer to his, and I let him. I closed my eyes as soon as I saw his face almost touching mine. But I didn’t feel his lips, not even his breath, just cold wind hitting hard against my face. I opened my eyes again to find myself in Keith’s bike. I looked around and recognized the same road as the other night, but there was something different; at the end of the road, I could distinguish a really bright light. When we got closer to it, I saw it was forest, and it was burning. Keith speeded up the bike, and drove straight onto it._

 

I opened my eyes and quickly sat up on my bed. What the actual fuck was that? What was wrong with my brain? Alright, little Lances in my head, who was responsible for this dream? Because you’re fired, grab your stuff and go. I rubbed my eyes and tried to calm myself. This was not my head’s fault; this was Keith’s fault. He’s been doing weird things these last days and he did something to my brain, not sure how or know why, but he did, I’m sure of it. He’s definitely evil. I stood up to wash my face and clear up a little when I noticed a piece of paper lying on the floor of my room, right next to the door. I made my way towards it and picked it up:

 

**“I came by earlier, but you called me ‘Hunk’ and told me to let you sleep. I just wanted to continue our project, it may be our free day, but I aim for a ten on everything, so yeah, come find me as soon as you read this, four eyes.”**

 

I sighed and let the note on my desk. This was the last thing I needed after waking up from that weird dream; a note from Keith. The mere thought of his name gave me goosebumps. And if this note was true; he was the one that knocked earlier. Maybe he got mad I didn’t open and cursed me with this dream. Can Keith do that? Am I going nuts? I sighed and walked over to the mirror to look at myself. What if I’m going crazy? Maybe the one acting weird is me and not Keith. I thought for a moment in these past days and… Nope. It was definitely Keith. He’s evil.

 

I sighed and walked towards my closet. Maybe I should go for a walk or something to clear my head; I don’t even know why I’m thinking so much about this. Come on, Lance, grow up, it was just a dream. I once dreamt about a chicken that spat fire and that chased me down all over the park I went to play when I was younger. So knowing how weird my imagination is when I sleep, this was probably just one random dream without sense. Why am I still thinking about it? I changed my clothes, put on my glasses, and walked outside my room. I walked slower as I passed Keith’s door, trying not to make any sound and give away I was out. Then I practically ran down the stairs instead of waiting for the elevator because I didn’t want to spend more time there.

 

I made my way out of the campus and decided to visit the small coffee shop just like five minutes away from here. As soon as I entered the smell of coffee and baked goods filled my nostrils and my mouth watered. I went to the counter, and a girl with long blonde hair wrapped in two ponytails and lips painted red, greeted me with the biggest of the smiles. “What can I do for you?” I looked at the menu and pointed at the third line. “I’ll take a cinnamon dolce latte.” The girl smiled. “Good choice.” She turned around and started to prepare my drink. Meanwhile, I looked over the cupcakes and cookies they had. She turned around with my latte. “Anything more?” “That giant chocolate cookie.” The girl nodded and handed me both things. “You ordered some of the sweetest things on the menu.” She commented with a small chuckle. I smirked, this seemed like a chance for Lancey Lance. “Well, I haven’t ordered the sweetest thing yet. Are you on the menu?” The girl smiled softly. “I’m sorry, that was really nice of you, but I’m taken.” She lifted up her hand to show me a circle on her palm. What a boring soulmark. “Then he’s a very lucky guy.” Her smile dropped a bit. “I think you meant that she’s a lucky girl.” Shit. I should really stop assuming people’s soulmates’ gender. “Sorry, my fault, two lucky girls then.” She grinned at that. I paid for my order and went to take a seat near the window.

 

I practically devoured my cookie and then slowly sipped my drink as I stared out of the window. I felt more relaxed now, why was I even freaking out in the first place? “Lance! Hello!” A sudden voice startled me, and I jumped a little on my seat. I turned around to look at Allura standing next to my table. “Oh, hey, Allura.” “I didn’t know you came here.” I tilted my head. “Why wouldn’t I? This is a beautiful place.” Allura chuckled and nodded. “You can sit with me if you want.” She shook her head. “Sorry, I need to leave now, I only bought a couple of cupcakes for a friend and me.” “Okay then, you two have fun.” She smiled and thanked me. “By the way is that yours?” She pointed at a paper folded down on the floor. I bent down and took the paper, unfolding it to see what was written on it. It was the notes Keith and I took the other day for our project. I noticed I was wearing the same jeans as that day, I probably left it there and fell when I sat down here. “Oh my gosh, yes. Thank you so much, I would probably die if I lost this.” Allura laughed. “You’re welcome then.” She waved at me goodbye and left the coffee shop.

 

I looked over the paper. It was my writing, but I only noted down what Keith had told me to. And I had to admit; this was really good, he sure was aiming for a ten, he’s not first in class for nothing. Maybe I was being selfish right now for evading him just because of a dream. Besides, he told me he already met his soulmate so it can’t be me, right? Maybe it was that Shiro guy he mentioned yesterday. That thought made me feel sad for some reason, and I felt the need to find out who Keith’s soulmate was.

 

I was standing right in front of Keith’s door, paper in hand. I don’t know why I felt so uneasy, I mean I never liked the idea of spending time with Keith even if it’s only for a project. But this feeling was new. I sighed and knocked on the door. He didn’t take long to answer the door. “Look who decided to show up.” I looked at him, and felt my face heat up; he had to be doing this on purpose. He was wearing a long red shirt that almost reached his knees and no fucking pants, I mean, the shirt covered enough but this wasn’t right. “You know the dress code says you have to wear pants, right?” He smirked. Classic. “This is my room; I wear what I want to.” I frowned not knowing what to answer. “Are you coming in or what?” I nodded and walked in.

 

I looked around, and Keith closed the door behind me. I let the feeling sunk in; I was in Keith’s room, it felt like entering the forbidden forest. Keith pointed at his bed, and I took it as a signal to sit down. He then handed me a book to place the paper there and a pen. “We need more information.” He sat on his desk and took his laptop. “But I think we have enough; this is already really good.” “No.” He said no more and started tapping on the keyboard, and a couple of minutes later he began dictating me what to write. I felt useless; he could do this by himself, wasn’t this supposed to be a team project? But, well, researching was boring, so I’ll leave it to him, I’ll do something else.

 

“So, when are you telling me who my soulmate is?” He looked up from his laptop. “Not now.” “And who’s yours?” He raised an eyebrow. “Why do you care?” Good question, Keith. Why do I care? I don’t even know. “Just curious.” He rolled his eyes and focused his gaze back on the screen. “Is it Shiro?” He looked at me again, slight confusion in his eyes. “Where did you even get that name?” “You mentioned him yesterday.” He said nothing and stood up, picked up some jeans, putting them on and giving me a full view of his boxers as he lift up his shirt a little in the process. I quickly looked away. “What are you doing?!” “It’s lunchtime; I’m going to eat.” I stood up. “Where?” “Taco Bell.” “I love that place! Can I go?” Keith looked at me confused but slightly pleased. I instantly regretted my words. “Aren’t you scared I’ll poison you?” He smirked once again, but there was no threat in his tone. “It’s a public place; someone will catch you if you try.” “Fair enough.” He went out of his room, and so did I, he then closed the door and walked to the stairs while I followed close. Why was I doing this again?


	5. Team Purple

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for reading this ❤ And I never mentioned this before, but this story occurred to me as I was listening to a song, I thought maybe you'd want to hear it? I'll leave it here if that's the case. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZB5LnNC-e0

We walked in silence towards the place. But I mean, in complete silence for almost ten minutes. We entered and walked to the counter to order. I took my wallet out to see what I could afford, and it seemed I only took enough money to go to the coffee shop earlier. “Shit, I didn’t think this through, I have no money.” Keith looked at me, and I expected him to be pissed, but instead, he smirked. “I guess you could say you weren’t thinking  _ straight _ .” There it was, that weird tone again. “I guess so?” Keith broke out in laughter like it was some kind of inside joke I didn’t understand. And I think I’ve never heard Keith laugh like this before; it sounded kinda nice, it was something I’d like to hear more. My phone buzzed, but I was too busy wondering why Keith reacted like that to check it. “What’s so funny?” Keith took his time to stop laughing and then looked at me, smile not fading away. “Nothing. What do you want? I’ll pay.” Was I dreaming again? This didn’t seem like something Keith would say. “What?” “I asked what do you want. You are not going to sit there and just watch me eat.” I raised an eyebrow, still not entirely convinced this was truly happening. “You mean you’re going to pay for my food? Like, do something nice for me?” Keith grinned. “I’ll pay for your food, but don’t get me wrong, this will have consequences.” I sighed. I really didn’t want to know what he meant by that, but I guessed I had no choice. I wasn’t just going to turn around and walk back to the campus.

 

We ordered our food, and we were currently waiting for it, in silence once again. I’m still wondering why I were there. Suddenly Keith’s phone started ringing, and he took it out. I glanced at his screen, the guy name Shiro was calling him. I still don’t know if he was Keith’s soulmate. “You take the food.” Keith said as he answered the call and walked away. I wish I could hear what he was saying. That reminded me of my phone buzzing earlier; it was a text from Hunk.

 

**Hunk:** Where are you?

**Me:** Taco Bell

**Hunk:** You went there without me? :(

**Me:** I’m with Keith

**Hunk:** Omg are you friends now?

**Me:** NO

**Hunk:** That’s great, this solves it all

**Me:** Did you even read what I said?

**Me:** What does it solve?

**Me:** Hunk?

**Me:** HUNK

 

And Hunk didn’t answer. A girl called Keith’s name, and I went to pick our food. I looked around for a place to sit down and chose a table next to the window. Keith didn’t take much longer to come back and sat right in front of me. “Who was it?” I asked. “Who was who?” “The call.” Keith looked a bit annoyed at my question. “It’s not of your business.” Geez. Why was this guy so secretive? “Was it your soulmate?” “Why are you suddenly so curious about who my soulmate is?” Believe me, Keith, I ask myself the same question. “So?” Keith spoke again. “So what?” “I asked you a question, dumbass.” Oh, right. “I ask you a lot of questions, and you never answer.” Keith nodded. “Okay, that’s fair.” 

 

We both finished eating and headed outside. I felt the urge to thank him for paying for my food. But the thing about it having consequences freaked me out a little, so I decided not to. “Lance!” Suddenly two big arms were wrapped around me. “Hunk? What are you doing here?” Hunk let go of me. “We came to pick you two up.” I noticed Pidge standing next to Hunk; she waved at me. “What do you mean by two?” Before Hunk could answer, Pidge interrupted. “So, how was the date?” I looked at her trying to communicate with my eyes how I was going to kill her, and she didn’t seem bothered by it. I then glanced at Keith to see his reaction to Pidge’s words; he didn’t appear to care. “So, Pidge and I thought of going to play laser tag today with you and Pidge’s brother, but Matt said he couldn’t come today. And seeing that you and Keith are friends now, he will be an excellent replacement.” And I thought Hunk was intelligent. This was by far the worst idea he has ever had. “For the second time, Hunk; Keith and I are not friends, and I’m sure Keith doesn’t want to come with us.” “Yes, I do.” What?! Hunk smiled widely and pulled Keith into a hug. And I thought it would bother him, but he just seemed genuinely surprised. He didn’t hug back though. “We’re going in my car.” Hunk said and started walking. I glared at Keith and when he noticed; he grinned. Stupid little shit. What did I do to deserve this?

 

“I call shotgun!” I shouted as soon as I saw Hunk’s car. Pidge almost instantly grabbed my arm trying to stop me. “That’s not fair! I don’t know Keith! You go in the back with him!” I freed myself from Pidge. “I don’t want to go with Keith either!” “Don’t say that; you’re hurting him!” I looked at Keith, who wasn’t hurt at all, just unimpressed. “Keith, you want to sit next to Lance, right?” Pidge asked him. “Yup.” Pidge grinned and ran to the passenger seat. When I entered the car, Hunk looked at me disappointed. “Stop acting like a kid, Lance.” Me? Acting like a kid? It’s not my fault they dragged Keith here. 

 

After what seemed like forever we arrived there. I jumped out of the car and waited for the rest to start walking. “At least I’ll get to shoot Keith without legal problems.” Pidge laughed. “I’m sorry, but you two are on the same team, I want to go with Hunk.” “You’re telling me that not only can’t shoot Keith that I also have to work with him?” Pidge smiled widely. “Yup. But that’s not the worst part. You two are going to lose to Team Green.” “She chose the name.” Hunk clarified. “That’s not true! Team Blue is going to beat your ass!” Keith looked at me with disgust. “Excuse me? We are Team Red.” Absolutely not. “Blue.” “Red.” Pidge coughed to grab our attention. “Why don’t you just combine your colors and go by purple?” Keith and I looked at her almost at the same time. “I’m not going to combine with Keith!” Pidge facepalmed. “The colors, not you two, idiot.” “I’m not going by the color purple.” Hunk turned around and showed us a paper. “Too late, I already signed you up as Team Purple.” “That’s betrayal!” Hunk chuckled. “Come on, let’s go in.”

 

We got our equipment, and the guy in charge explained us the rules, like if I didn’t know them by heart. We entered the battlefield and Keith, and I went to our base. I cannot believe I was on the same team as him but what bothered me the most was Pidge, threatening me, in my own game. She’s going to eat her words. “Look, we’re winning Pidge, so do as I say.” Keith laughed. “I don’t follow anyone else’s rules, four ey-” I placed my index finger on his lips to shut him up, just like he did the other day to me. And to my surprise, he did become silent and stared at me like if it was something he didn’t expect from me, like if it was something weird for me to do. And I’ll admit it, with Keith; it was. “I am an excellent sharpshooter, so I’ll hide near the base and protect it. And I guess that you’ll be good at the exact opposite of me, so you’ll go and attack the base. And don’t get tagged. Got it?” To my surprise, Keith nodded, and I removed my finger from his face. I looked around and spotted the best hiding place. As soon as the game started, I saw Keith running away to the other’s base. 

 

I stayed hidden as I heard laser sounds going off, I really wish Keith wasn’t fucking up my game, my pride was on the line. Then between the shadows, I spotted my prey. Pidge emerged and looked around, apparently satisfied to see that no one was around. I let her get closer to our base and… Pow! Pow! Pow! Pidge jumped in surprise and looked around as she ran away from our base until I no longer could saw her. Where was Hunk? I hope they didn’t have the same plan as Keith and I did. In second thought; who cares if they did? They didn’t have me on their team, and my team always win no matter what and I’m determined to keep this up. If I lose because of Keith; I’m suing him.

 

The game ended and the only person I saw during the whole game was Pidge. So I guessed Hunk was defending his base and Keith was attacking it the whole time. Well, I couldn’t care less what those two were up to, because, guess which team got more points. That’s right, ladies. Team Purple won. I reunited with my friends, and as soon as I saw Pidge, I grinned at her. “Hear that Pidge? Is the sound of you losing and me winning.” Pidge rolled her eyes, and Keith walked towards me smiling. I was so happy and proud for winning that as soon as Keith got close to me, I raised my hand towards him for a high five. Keith looked at my hand surprised but then pressed our hands together with a loud ‘clap', and as he did so, he seemed genuinely happy. Hunk smiled widely at the scene. “I knew you guys would make a great team.” I turned to look at Hunk; I guess he was right, we did win by plenty of points. But it would feel weird saying so out loud. “Yup, but just because I was defending our base, every team is a great team if I’m in it.” Keith happiness was erased from his face as soon as I spoke. “That’s not true! If I wouldn’t have been attacking you would have half the points we made!” Hunk nodded. “He’s right.” I glared at Hunk, but we both knew I wasn’t mad. “That’s the second betrayal today, Hunk!” He chuckled and shook his head. “Come on, let’s head back.” 

 

Hunk drove Pidge home and then made his way to our campus. When we got off the car, I hugged Hunk goodbye, and Keith simply waved at him. Then we went our separate ways; Hunk left and Keith and I right. We walked in silence towards our dorm. I felt the need to say something, for some reason the silence was now killing me. “Sorry we didn’t get much done on our project today.” Keith looked at me, and it seemed like had completely forgotten about the whole project thing. “Don’t worry; we have plenty of time” I nodded.

 

We entered the building and chose the stairs. “I had fun today; your friends are cool.” It felt weird having a… Nice? Yes, I guess I could call it that. A nice conversation with Keith. “Yes, they’re great.” Keith nodded and smiled a little. “Thank you for not doing anything evil today.” He laughed at that. “What exactly do you mean by ‘anything evil’?” I thought about it for a moment and frowned. “I don’t know! But you should stop it! It makes me feel weird!” Keith smirked. “What do you mean by weird?” His tone felt like teasing. “You’re doing it now!” He laughed more and the sound of it made me smile. “What do you usually think about before you sleep, Lance?” Okay, that was random. “I don’t know. Stuff that worries me? Something that happened recently? Why do you ask?” “I want to give you something to think about.” I raised an eyebrow, somehow curious at what he was about to say.”The weird feeling you speak of. I want you to think about it. Is it a good feeling or a bad one?”


	6. Good or bad

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for your comments! ❤ And I'm repeating myself every time, but it just makes me so happy all of you are enjoying this

_ “The weird feeling you speak of. I want you to think about it. Is a good feeling or a bad one?” _

 

And that’s what I did. I laid in bed and thought about what Keith had told me. Obviously not because I had been told to, it was because I wanted to. Because, yeah, his words lighted even more curiosity in me about why I felt so weird whenever he… I don’t even know what he did. I mean, he had to be doing something, he somehow admitted he was, I think. I tried to recall every time I felt weird around Keith, well, I’ve only felt like that around Keith, but I still couldn’t tell what he was doing, I think sometimes he wasn’t even doing anything; yesterday I felt weird just because he wasn’t wearing pants, I think. Why? Okay. That’s not the point. Is it a good feeling? My first guess would be no, because I think it bothers me, but it doesn’t bother me in a bad way. I don’t even know if that makes sense. Is it a bad one? Well, it makes me nervous, and when I feel nervous it’s never something good but this is a different kind of nervous, it makes me feel… excited? This isn’t right. I just keep saying things and denying them a second later. Why is it so difficult to figure out what is happening with me? Or better said; what is happening with Keith.

 

Suddenly Hunk poked my shoulder making me jump a little on my seat in surprise. I looked at him. 

 

“You’re chewing on your pencil.” 

 

I looked down at my hand holding the pencil to my mouth. I immediately took it out of my mouth; I didn’t even notice I was doing this. 

 

“Is there something wrong, Lance?” 

 

I shook my head. “Nope, I’m totally fine, why?” 

 

Hunk frowned. “You seem more distracted than usual.” 

 

“I’m good. Just a little tired from winning you yesterday.” 

 

Hunk shook his head smiling a little. 

 

I looked over to Keith’s desk, hoping he would stare at me like he always does. I mean, not because I like that he stares at me… Or do I? I quickly shook my head. I just wanted him to look at me and give that odd smile he usually wears, so I could feel that weird thing again and try to see if I liked it or not. But he wasn’t there; he wasn’t anywhere in the classroom. I wonder why.

 

When all my classes had reached an end, I hadn’t seen Keith yet. I walked in front of his room and looked at the door. I still wanted Keith to make me feel that way so that I could answer the question. Not to him, but to me, I wanted to know. I walked into my room and left my bag on my bed, then exited almost immediately and stopped in front of Keith’s door. Should I knock? What do I even say? I sighed and knocked. Keith took his time but eventually opened the door. He was wrapped in a blanket, his eyes were a bit puffy, his nose was bright red and his hair was even messier than the usual. I guess that explained why he wasn’t in class earlier.

 

“What do you want?” 

 

I should have thought this through. What do I say now? Should I go straight to the point? He kept staring at me, expecting an answer. Okay, here I go. 

 

“Do something evil.” I think he had never looked at me as confused as he was at that moment. 

 

“Excuse me?” 

 

“Do something evil, so I can decide how I feel about it.” 

 

Keith blinked. “Um… I can’t. What you call ‘doing something evil’ just comes naturally to me, I guess. You can’t just ask me to do it. And I think right now is not a good moment.” 

 

I pouted. “But I want to know it now.” 

 

Keith rolled his eyes. “Then do something that you think it would give you that feeling, and I’ll imitate you.”

 

Alright. That seemed harder than waking up early in the morning, and that was the ultimate level of difficulty. I think that every time I felt that way it had something to do with Keith’s body; exposing some of it, weird movements, smiles… I guess his laugh kinda did a funny thing for me yesterday? Maybe some kind of physical contact would do the thing. But how? I examined Keith and noticed one of his hands poking out of the blanket. I can’t believe I’m doing this.

 

I reached for Keith’s hand held it. I was fucking holding Keith’s hand. His hand was very warm, unlike the day he placed a finger on me to shut me up, maybe it was because he was ill. But there it was, the weird feeling, and stronger than ever. Was it because this time I was the one doing something evil? Did I just call holding hands evil? I looked at our hands, Keith was making no effort to pull away. I interlocked our fingers, and the feeling grew even stronger. Keith hesitantly closed his hand around mine, making my whole body heat up. And I don’t know about the other times, but that feeling, at that moment; it was good.

 

I realized I’ve been just staring at our hands the whole time. What was Keith thinking? Why wasn’t he pulling away and insulting me? I slowly looked up at him. He was staring at me wide-eyed and… Wait. Was Keith blushing? It probably was just because he had a fever, right? 

 

“Lance, I… I literally never did something like this to you.” 

 

I’m aware of that. I don’t even know why I thought this was a good an idea. But we were still holding hands, why wasn’t Keith letting go? Maybe he was so in shock I did something this stupid, and he couldn’t move. Oh my god. I moved away from him and looked back at his face. He was still staring at me with the same expression. His lips suddenly parted like he was about to say something and my whole body tensed. I don’t think I was ready to hear what Keith was about to say, whether it was something good or something bad. So this is what I did. I freaking turned around and started running away from him before he could even say a word. This was me, Lance the brave, enduring scary things in life like a man.

 

I ran outside the building and then looked back to see if Keith had followed me. He hadn’t. I sighed in relief and walked towards a bench. I sat down. I think that was the most awkward moment I’ve had in awhile. I still don’t understand why it made me feel that way. I held hands with other boys before, like my dad, my nephews, even with Hunk. And neither of those felt like this. I mean, this did feel good for some reason, but maybe that was a bad thing. It was definitely a bad thing with Keith. Because it’s not like Keith and I will hold hands again.

 

I stared at my hand, the one that had been in contact with Keith’s. And I swear I could still feel the warmness of Keith’s touch in it. Like he was here, still holding my hand. Is this going to last long? I wouldn’t mind.

 

“Lance?” 

 

I jumped in surprise and looked up towards where the voice had come from. 

 

“Hunk! This is the second time you scare me today! Dammit!” I expected him to laugh, but instead, he looked at me with a worried expression and sat down next to me. 

 

“Lance, you know you can tell me if something is wrong, right?” Did I really look so troubled? Should I tell him what happened? I didn’t even know where to start. 

 

“But there’s nothing wrong.” 

 

“I’ve just watched you stare at your hand for five solid minutes.” I don’t think I’ve been here for that long. I instantly looked at my hand; I could still feel Keith’s hand. 

 

“Is there something wrong with your hand? I’m getting worried.” 

 

Hunk went to grab my hand to look at it and I quickly moved away from him. I was scared that if Hunk touched me, the nice feeling in my hand would go away. But my sudden movement seemed to make Hunk even more concerned about me.

 

“Okay. None of us is leaving until you tell me what’s going on.” 

 

When Hunk said something like that, he meant it. And maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea telling Hunk what was going on. Maybe he could give some thoughts on it. So that’s what I did, I told him everything, starting from when I first noticed the weird feeling and ending with the holding hands and then running away incident. 

 

“So, you’re basically telling me you have a crush on Keith.” 

 

“What the actual fuck, Hunk?! I do not. I’m straight, and you know that. And we’re talking about Keith here.  _ Keith _ .” 

 

He acted like he hadn’t heard a word from what I’ve just said and muttered to himself. “I can’t believe Pidge was right.” 

 

“Are you even listening to me?!” That seemed to grab his attention, and he looked at me again. 

 

“Are you listening to yourself?” 

 

I raised an eyebrow. Of course, I’m listening to myself. I’ve been listening to myself thinking the exact same things I’ve just spit out, over and over again. At my lack of response, Hunk spoke again. 

 

“Maybe you should try and talk this out with Keith.” Wow. Just, wow. Hunk seemed to be getting the worst ideas lately. 

 

“Hey, Keith. I know we’re starting to become  friends somehow, but I’m here to fuck that up because you make me feel weird sometimes and my best friend thinks it’s because I have a crush on you.” 

 

Hunk rolled his eyes. “Okay, maybe not like that. But I really believe that you should tell him all of this. Maybe he can give you a better answer than me.” 

 

“How am I supposed to get any answers from him? He won’t even tell me who my soulmate is.” 

 

Hunk thought for a moment. “I think I get an idea why… Don’t know why he would do that though. Do you know something about Keith’s soulmate?” Oh. Right. I haven’t given a thought about Keith’s possible soulmate with all of this. 

 

“He said he met him. I think it's someone named Shiro.” 

 

“Did he tell you that?” 

 

I shook my head. “He never tells me anything. I simply assumed because I think it’s kinda obvious.” 

 

Hunk nodded. “And how does that make you feel? The idea of Keith having this guy named Shiro as his soulmate.” 

 

Not good. I’d even say it makes me a little sad to think about it. But I don’t really have an explanation why. I don’t seem to have an explanation for anything regarding Keith. 

 

“You don’t have to answer now if you don’t want to. Just give it a thought.” 

 

I nodded. “I think I should head back to my room and rest a bit. Thanks for listening, I guess.” Hunk pulled me into a hug and then we parted our different ways.

 

I passed Keith’s room. His door was closed, and I heard no sound coming from it, but just thinking about what happened there not so long ago sent shivers down my spine. I entered my room and crashed on the bed. I raised my arm up and stared at my hand. I didn’t feel Keith’s warmness anymore. It made me feel somehow empty or like something important was missing. I wished I could hold Keith’s hand one more time.


	7. Keith's hand

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so repetitive but thank you again for your comments ❤ And I think you all have noticed by now, but I have no idea about astronomy, so that's why I'm not specifying anything when they speak about the project, I hope that doesn't bother anyone too much.

Next morning, when I arrived in class, Keith wasn’t there. It wasn’t something rare though, but I wondered if he was still ill. I suddenly felt bad about not asking him how he was or trying to help in any way. In fact, I did quite the opposite. I felt embarrassed just remembering what happened. I wonder what Keith had thought at that moment. 

 

I walked to my usual seat next to Hunk, and he smiled at me. 

 

“How are you doing?” 

 

“I just woke up, how do you think I am?” 

 

Hunk rolled his eyes. “Have you talked with Keith?” If I’m not thinking about Keith; someone speaks about Keith. Why is my life like this? 

 

“Are you seriously bringing that first thing in the morning?” 

 

“I’ll take that as a no.” He paused for a moment. “You should.” 

 

I rolled my eyes and started to take my stuff out of my bag. Then black hair caught my eye. Keith entered the classroom. He looked way better than yesterday. What I meant is that he didn’t look ill anymore. He looked right back at me, I expected one of his odd smiles, but he simply stared at me until he sat down. Was he mad at me because of what happened yesterday? Was he mad at me because of holding his hand or running away after it? Or both?

 

Coran stood up and grabbed the class’ attention. 

 

“As you all know, I gave you little time to finish your project because it’s a really easy one that you all could do perfectly alone, but you needed to bond as a class. So I hope you all have finished by now and just need to revise errors for tomorrow.” 

 

What the heck does he mean by ‘for tomorrow’?! I thought it was for Friday! I looked at Keith, and his gaze was on me, and he looked as terrified as I felt right now. I felt like this was my fault. If we had worked when Keith wanted us to, we would have finished by now, even if we didn’t know it was for tomorrow. I’m the worst.

 

As soon as all my lessons ended, I ran towards my room to grab some stuff and go to work on the project with Keith. But before I could do anything there was knocking on my door. I opened, and Keith quickly walked inside. 

 

“Oh, hello, Keith. Of course, you can come in.” I said sarcastically as he approached my desk. 

 

“Shut the fuck up.” Keith took my laptop without permission and turned it on. 

 

“Yeah, sure, you can use my laptop too.” 

 

Keith looked at me with a serious expression on his face. “We need to finish this now, Lance. Give me what you wrote down and I’ll type it nice and clean into the computer.” 

 

I nodded and handed him the papers. “And what am I supposed to do? Be useless and stare at you as you work?” 

 

“Can you search for some images? And draw some graphs, I'm not really good at that.” Keith wasn't good at something? Incredible. I fought the urge to mock him about it and nodded.

 

It was almost night time when we both finished our tasks. And I had been so focused on the project that I didn't even have time to feel flustered about what happened yesterday. 

 

“I think it should be good if I read the final thing out loud. I added a few things, so just tell me if you notice anything wrong.” 

 

I nodded, and he walked towards the bed and sat next to me. He began reading, and I followed every word until I noticed his hand resting on my bed, really close to mine. Suddenly I didn't hear Keith voice anymore, and I could only focus my eyes on his hand.

 

_ “Maybe you should try and talk this out with Keith.” _

 

Hunk’s words echoed through my head. Talk about what exactly? Hey, Keith, you make me feel weird but nice at the same time, and I think it’s because I have a crush on you, let’s talk about that. No. Wait. Hunk thinks I have a crush on Keith. I mean, I’ll admit he’s good-looking, and that suddenly is oddly nice spending time with him and… Ugh. I looked again at Keith's hand. He was still reading out loud, but I haven’t heard a single word. I remembered how I felt yesterday holding his hand and now it was extremely close; it was killing me. I had to do something.

 

“Um… Keith?” 

 

He immediately stopped talking and looked at me with a worried expression. “What? Did I write something wrong? Tell me.” 

 

I shook my head. “No, no, it’s not that…” 

 

“Then why are you interrupting me?” Keith didn’t look worried anymore. I’d say he was slightly pissed off or maybe just stressed. 

 

“Can I hold your hand?” Did I just fucking say that? 

 

Keith’s angry expression disappeared and he blinked a couple of times without saying anything. Then he turned his gaze back to the laptop. I fucked up. Suddenly I felt something cold embracing my hand. Keith was slowly placing his hand on mine until he interlocked his fingers with mine. Unlike yesterday, Keith’s fingertips were extremely cold. I hesitantly closed my hand around his, and I heard him let out a sigh. I looked at him, but his stare was still focused on the screen. Then, as if nothing had happened, he continued reading out loud. And we stayed like that, like if holding your ex-enemy’s hand while he reads the project you two did together was the most normal thing in the world.

 

As time passed, Keith's hand became warmer around mine and so did the feeling in my chest. I no longer felt nervous about this, and it felt even nicer than I remembered. When Keith finished reading, he turned to look at me, still not letting go of my hand. 

 

“Do you think it's okay? Did we miss anything?” 

 

To be honest, I hadn't been paying much attention to what Keith was saying. I was too focused on our hands and the strange feeling that came with it. Still, when I was reading some of it while searching for images, I thought it lacked something. Maybe if we looked at the outline, Keith could realize what was missing. The paper was on my desk. I sighed and let go of Keith's hand to go take it. The sudden exposure of air on my hand made it cold. I grabbed the paper and turned around to go back and sit next to Keith. He was looking at his hand. I wonder what he was thinking. I sat down and showed him the paper. His gaze focused on the paper and his eyes went wide. 

 

“Oh my god, we don't have anything about this!” He said clearly in panic as he pointed at something on the paper. He stood up and looked at me. “Come on; we need to go now; there's this really good book about it in the library. We take it, and we can still finish on time.” 

 

I'd never seen Keith this stressed. I guess he really wanted the highest mark on everything. 

 

“We can't. The library is closed. We can search on the Internet though.” 

 

Keith shook his head. “No. We need this book. Let's go; I've done this many times.” 

 

“You mean sneaking in the library when it's closed?” 

 

Keith nodded. What is he even doing in the library when it's closed? There is plenty of time to go during the day. 

 

“Haven't you been caught?” 

 

“A couple of times. But it's okay, don't worry about it.” 

 

A couple of times? How many nights had he sneaked in there? Since I wasn't standing up, Keith grabbed my hand and pulled me up. Then he walked out of the room still pulling me. His hand was holding mine again I just couldn't say no to that. I bet he knew that.

 

We walked out of the building and towards the library. I looked down at our hands. I wondered what anyone would think if they saw us like this.

 

Keith let go of my hand when we reached the building and moved to walk in front of me. 

 

“Stay close and always behind me.” 

 

I nodded, even though he didn't see me. Once again I felt the emptiness in my hand, but I decided it was better not to think about it. Keith looked carefully from every corner making sure no one was there to saw us. We managed to enter the library unseen, but I was still nervous. What if we get caught? I have never done something wrong here; I bet it would highly affect me. 

 

Keith walked straight to one section like he knew exactly where he was going. He looked over the shelves and picked up one book. 

 

“This is the one.” He said proudly. 

 

“Okay, let's go now.” 

 

Keith nodded, and before we started to walk, we heard a voice. 

 

“Is someone there?” Oh no, oh no, oh no. They caught us. 

 

Keith pulled me close to him to hide behind the shelves. I felt my breathing go faster because of how nervous and scared I was of getting caught. Keith tapped my shoulder, and I looked at him. I hadn't realized how close we actually were until that moment. Keith's face started to get even closer to mine, and my first thought was that he was going to kiss me. And with that in mind, I stayed still. Instead, he moved his lips close to my ear to whisper so no one could hear him. I was… disappointed? 

 

“Stay here. I'll go and tell him it is me. Don't go out until you're sure he and I are gone.” 

 

“What? But you'll get in trouble.” I tried to speak as quietly as I could. There are no words to describe how nervous I was. 

 

“It wouldn't be the first time, don't worry.” 

 

I wanted to say something; I didn't want all the blame to go to Keith since I was here too. But at the same time, I didn't want to get caught. So I simply nodded. 

 

“Take the book and finish the project or I'll kill you.” With that, he pulled away from me and walked away.

 

A few seconds later I heard Keith's voice. 

 

“Hi.” I couldn't help but roll my eyes. Keith was stupid. Then I heard the man’s voice again. 

 

“You again? How many times have I told you to come here when it’s open?” The man sounded extremely angry, but I didn’t hear Keith give any sort of answer. 

 

“Come on; you’re coming with me.” The man spoke again, and then I heard footsteps walking away. 

 

I hope Keith didn’t get in much trouble; I felt terribly bad for letting him take the blame on his own, even though he was the one that dragged me here... 

 

I waited for a little bit more and then slowly made my way out. There was no one outside. No sign of Keith. I went back to my room and opened the book to finish our project. I wanted to do this as best as I could so wouldn't disappoint Keith. I’ll make sure we get the highest mark, don’t worry about it, Keith.


	8. Gone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, it's me, about to repeat myself again; thank you for your wonderful comments! Reading them actually makes me really happy ❤

I woke up the next morning more tired than ever. I stayed up really late just to finish the project, Keith better thank me for this. Keith. I wonder what happened last night when they caught him instead of us both. I still felt bad about it. It wasn't fair to him; he wasn't the only one there. I sighed and stood up. I dressed up, brushed my teeth and did my hair. I took my glasses because I was too lazy to put on my lenses and grabbed a cookie for the walk to class.

 

I arrived at class earlier than Keith, as always. Coran was on his desk. I walked towards him and proudly handed him the project. Coran smiled at me. 

 

“Have you talked to Keith? How is he doing after what happened?” Oh, so the teachers already knew about last night this early in the morning. 

 

“I still haven't talked to him today.” 

 

Coran nodded and thanked me for giving him the project. I looked around, and Hunk was already in his seat, so I walked towards there and sat down next him. 

 

“How did the project go?” My mind instantly went to Keith and I holding hands in my bed and then to the sneaking in the library and getting caught incident. 

 

“There had been some… complications.” 

 

Hunk tilted his head confused. 

 

“Better not to ask.” 

 

“I already asked. Tell me, don't leave me hanging.” Hunk pouted, and I just shrugged.

 

Suddenly Coran stood up to begin the class. I looked over to Keith's seat; he was later than the usual. I felt a funny feeling in my stomach, this time I was more than sure that I didn't like it. There had to be a good reason why Keith wasn't in class, nothing bad I hope. 

 

“Good morning and thank you to everyone that handed their projects on time.” 

 

Coran kept talking, but I was more focused on the door waiting for Keith to walk in. This wasn't good, ever since I started… feeling weird about Keith, I didn't focus in class or anywhere else as much as I did before.

 

When all of my lessons ended, there had been no sign of Keith at all. So I quickly walked to my room, left my bag there and went to knock on Keith's door. I waited a few moments, and I was only greeted by silence. Maybe he overslept and was still in bed? I knocked again, louder this time. Still no answer. Was Keith ignoring me? Was he mad at me for leaving him last night? But that can't be; he was the one that told me to stay there. Wait. What if it was a test? He told me from the very beginning that he wanted to prove something. Why did he want to prove something again? Oh, right. To tell me who my soulmate is. I totally had forgotten about that. I have a soulmate, and so does Keith, and he already knows him, and he's going to space with him. But if Keith knew my soulmate that meant that she… or he was someone close to him; you don't usually see people’s back. I hoped that whoever my soulmate is, that they were as amazing as Keith.

 

“Keith? Buddy? Open up; I'm sorry about last night.” 

 

Still nothing. Was he that mad at me? Or wasn't him in his room? If that was the case; where was he? And even if he was mad at me, I'm sure he’d come to me to see if I had finished and handed the project. This was weird. I knocked once again, even louder this time, just to make sure. I was answered by silence again. I needed to go get Hunk.

 

“Maybe they gave him detention?” Hunk suggested as I sat on his bed. 

 

“The whole day? He should be in his room right now if that were the case.” 

 

Hunk shrugged. “Maybe he went training.” 

 

I still don't think he would have gone training without checking if I finished the project. But I was out of ideas. 

 

“Okay, let's search for him.”

 

Hunk and I searched the whole campus and even some places nearby, but Keith was nowhere to be found. I'm sure there was a logical explanation for all of this. Maybe he had a family emergency and needed to leave? No. He doesn't have a family… Maybe he was indeed mad at me.

 

“Let's go see if he is back in his room.” I nodded, and we made our way to Keith's room. 

 

When we arrived there, I knocked again. Nothing. 

 

“Maybe he is angry with me, and he doesn't want to see me. You say something to see if he responds.” 

 

Hunk nodded and knocked on the door. “Keith, it's me Hunk. Please open up, Lance is worried.” And once again we heard no sound. 

 

“Don't you have his number or something?” 

 

I shook my head. Keith and I never exchanged numbers. I don't even have his email. There was no way I could contact him. And I never saw him with anyone else around here; so I don't think he has any friend to ask them where he was.

 

“That’s it!” 

 

Hunk jumped a little in surprise and looked at me confused. I took my phone out and searched for Pidge’s number. 

 

“Who are you calling?” 

 

I didn’t answer Hunk and went straight to call Pidge. She took her time to answer the phone, but I eventually heard her voice on the other side of the line. 

 

“Yeah?” 

 

“Pidge! I need your help! You can track people with your computer or phone or something, right?” There were a few seconds of silence. 

 

“Um, it depends, why?” 

 

“I need you to track down Keith.” 

 

I saw Hunk shaking his head in disappointment. Why? This was a great idea! 

 

“I’m not helping you with your jealousy problems, Lance.” 

 

“What are you talking about?! That’s not it!” 

 

I heard her laugh and I sighed. I explained her everything that happened yesterday, without mentioning the holding hands thing, Pidge didn’t need to know that, and how I can’t find him anywhere. 

 

“Aww, you’re worried about your boyfriend. So cute.” 

 

“Yeah, Pidge, I’m worried. Now quit the bullshit, please.” 

 

I expected her to laugh or mock me again, but she didn’t. She even sounded serious when she spoke again. 

 

“Have you tried calling him first?” 

 

“No. I don’t have his number.” There was silence. 

 

“You know I need his number to do track him, right?” 

 

“What?! You can’t be serious! What do I do now? This was the only idea I had!” 

 

Pidge sighed. “Why don’t you try asking the principal or something?” 

 

Asking the principal… Pidge had a point. Alfor would most likely know where Keith was unless it didn’t had anything to do with the sneaking in the library thing last night. But if I do ask the principal about it, I’ll need to explain that I was there with Keith. And that would mean ruining my spotless two years of not doing absolutely anything bad here. Plus my mother would be very disappointed… Do I really need that bad to know where Keith is? Am I really this worried? It was really weird that Keith hadn’t shown up yet asking me about our project. What should I do? It’s either knowing where Keith is and ruining my reputation or not ruin my reputation and wait like a coward to see if Keith appears. Lance, think,  what is really your priority?

 

I said goodbye to Pidge and hang up. Hunk was staring at me waiting for me to say something. 

 

“I’m going to the principal’s office to ask if they know where Keith is.” 

 

Hunk nodded. “That’s actually a good idea.” 

 

“I know, it was Pidge’s idea.” 

 

Hunk smiled softly. “Want me to go with you?” 

 

I shook my head. “No, don’t worry about it.” 

 

“Alright, tell me about it when you finished, okay?” I nodded and started to walk away from Hunk.

 

I walked slower than ever, and when I did arrive at the principal’s office I stood in front of the door, and I could felt myself trembling. Was I really going to confess? Keith got himself caught so that I wouldn’t have to do this. But here I was. And all because of Keith. I sighed and tried to calm myself down before knocking on the door.

 

“Come in.” 

 

Alfor’s voice sent shivers down my spine, but not the kind Keith’s voice gave me, this time it was a bad feeling. I slowly opened the door and walked inside. 

 

“Oh, Lance, hello. Please, sit down.” I nodded and did as I was told. 

 

“Hello, sir.” 

 

Alfor smiled warmly. “Please, call me Alfor, you know that. So, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?” I sighed. Okay, Lance, you can do this. 

 

“I wanted to know if by any chance you know where Keith is. He was caught last night sneaking in the library so I figured maybe you could have some information about it.” 

 

Alfor looked at me with curiosity. “But it seems you already have talked to him. Didn’t he tell you about it?” 

 

Tell me about what exactly? That meant there was actually something. I shook my head. 

 

“How did you know about last night then?” And here I go. 

 

“I… I actually was there with him.” 

 

He nodded. “I see. But why? That’s not like you Lance. Did Keith force you?” I didn’t want to go, but he didn’t exactly force me either. Obviously, I couldn’t say that out loud. 

 

“No. We went there because we needed to finish the project last night.” 

 

“You were doing a project with Keith?” He looked genuinely surprised. 

 

“Professor Coran assigned the pairs for the project.” 

 

He nodded. “I see. I’ll have to talk about it with Coran. He shouldn’t have paired you up with Keith; he’s a bad influence. Sure he had great marks, but his behavior didn’t match up. You even had come to me a few times because of him disturbing you.” Why is he talking about Keith in the past tense? 

 

“Yeah… well, so where is he then?”

 

Alfor thought for a moment. “As I’ve just said, his behavior was never good. He couldn’t continue like this. We warned him, but he still did as he pleased. Good grades aren’t everything, you know?” I nodded in agreement. 

 

“So… What does this mean? Where’s Keith?” 

 

I felt myself become even tenser as Alfor sighed.

 

“As I’ve just said, Keith made no effort to change his behavior even after our warnings.” He made a pause that made me feel even more nervous than before. 

 

“Due to this, I’m afraid Keith is no longer allowed to attend class here.” He didn’t just say what I think he just said.

 

“What do you mean by that?” It was a stupid question, I was aware of that, but I refused to believe what I’ve just heard. 

 

“He’s been expelled, Lance.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THE END. 
> 
> Nah, but you'll like the next chapter (at least I think so)


	9. Two hours

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You all commented so fast in the last chapter and I was so happy. And I die a little inside when someone says they love this or things like 'another dope chapter' is just like ❤❤❤ And I really hope you all like this chapter because I rewrote this so many times until I was happy with it.

After talking to Alfor for a while, I ran to Hunk's room. I repeatedly knocked on the door until he opened. 

 

“Hey, calm down. What happened? Did the principal tell you where Keith is?” 

 

“Yeah, and I need your car like right now.” 

 

Hunk furrowed his brows. “Why do you need my car?” 

 

“Because I don't have one of my own.” 

 

Hunk sighed. “Yeah, I knew that part, but why don't you explain things a little?” 

 

“Keith got expelled, and I managed to convince Alfor to tell me his home address.” 

 

Hunk blinked in disbelief, but I wasn't sure if It was because of Keith expulsion or the fact that I wanted to visit him right away. I needed to see him; I felt like this was my fault. If we had worked on the project when he told me to, we could have finished on time. And if we had, there should have been no use in sneaking in the library. But of course, I also didn't want to lose whatever we had. Was it friendship? It didn't feel like it, but it sure felt nice.

 

“How long does it take to arrive there?” 

 

“Two hours or so.” 

 

Hunk blinked a couple of times. “And you want to go now?” 

 

I nodded, and he ran a hand through his hair. “You're aware you can't go today, right?” 

 

“I can and I will… if you lend me your car. Please, lend me your car.” 

 

Hunk sighed. “Of course I will, Lance. But not today; tomorrow.” 

 

What?! I can't wait that long! I thought Hunk would want to help me! 

 

“You have class tomorrow morning. And it's a long way to Keith's house; there's no way you could go now.” 

 

“I can't just sit down and wait until tomorrow when I could go see him right now!” I guess screaming at Hunk wasn't very nice of me and he had nothing to do with this. But I couldn't help it. 

 

“No, you can't go now. Look why don't we spend the rest of the day making some cupcakes for you to bring Keith tomorrow? I'm sure he'll appreciate it.” 

 

I sighed and tried to calm myself down. I guess he was right. If I did go now, the time I’ll spend in the car plus the time in Keith's house, if he did open the door because there was a possibility that he didn't want to see me, I would come back late and probably wouldn't be able to go to class tomorrow. And if I bring Keith cupcakes they could serve as an apology. So I sighed and nodded, which made Hunk grin. 

 

We went out to the supermarket near the campus and bought all the ingredients Hunk said. Then we headed back to the campus and went to the kitchen. There were already a few people there, but we’d be able to make the cupcakes without any problem. Hunk took out all the ingredients, and we followed the steps that Hunk seemed to know by heart.

 

When we finished, they smelled so good that it physically pained me not to eat one. 

 

“You should take one; it's not fair that you did almost all the job and didn't eat one.” 

 

Hunk smiled but shook his head. “No, they're for Keith and for you if he wants to share.” 

 

He'd better share. I nodded and took the cupcakes to my room after saying goodbye to Hunk. That night I barely slept because of how nervous I was.

 

The next morning all my lessons seemed to last forever, and I couldn't focus on any of them. Keith was so bad for my concentration. As soon as the last one ended I stared at Hunk, whom smiled at me and handed me his car keys. I ran to my room to leave my bag and take the cupcakes. I then searched for Hunk's car and got inside. I tried not to think of every possible way going for a two-hour ride to Keith's home could go wrong and started the car.

 

Midway I stopped the car to grab something to eat. I really should have eaten something earlier before rushing into the car. I quickly ate a shitty hamburger next to a gas station and headed back to the car as soon as I finished. 

 

Exactly sixty-three minutes later I was parked in front of what seemed to be Keith's house. I simply sat there trembling. I was so nervous I couldn't really believe I was there. I didn't even have thought of what to say. What if Keith wasn't the one to open the door? Did he live with someone? Okay, Lance, calm down. Everything should be alright; I'll just go with the flow, that's what I always do. I got out of the car and slowly walked to the front door. I rang the bell, and soon I heard footsteps approaching. Please let it be Keith.

 

The door opened and in front of me stood a tall man who looked around twenty-seven, with muscular arms, short black hair, slightly longer at the front and a prosthetic arm. He stared right back at me, and that's when I realized I was just standing there without saying anything. 

 

“Um… Is Keith home?” 

 

The man smiled and nodded. “Yes, are you a friend of him?” I guess? I mean, I drove for two hours just to see him. So I nodded. 

 

“I'm Lance.” The man instantly looked happier at the mention of my name. 

 

“So you're Lance! Keith speaks a lot about you. I'm so glad to finally meet you.” Keith speaks a lot about me? “I'm Shiro by the way.” 

 

This man is Shiro? So I guess I was standing right in front of Keith's soulmate, this felt so… Bad. He looked like a living sculpture, no wonder he's linked with Keith, he doesn't deserve anything less. He extended his arm for a handshake. My first instinct was to refuse, but he hasn't done anything to me. I shook his hand, and he smiled at me again. 

 

“He's in his room, upstairs. Knock before entering; he’s kinda… grumpy right now.” 

 

I nodded and walked upstairs. There were only two rooms; it wasn’t a big house. I guessed Keith was in the one with the door closed; I wonder why they didn’t share a room if they were supposed to be soulmates. I gently knocked on the door and waited for an answer. 

 

“Oh my god! For the last time, Shiro; I don’t want any ice cream!” The image of the big guy downstairs offering Keith ice cream nonstop made me chuckle. 

 

“It’s Lance.” 

 

There was no response from the other side of the door. But a few seconds later the door opened revealing a tired looking Keith. He stared at me with a confused or surprised expression; I wasn’t sure which of the two. Why was he not talking? Should I say something myself? I raised my hand holding the bag of cupcakes to show it to him. 

 

“These are cupcakes not ice cream, so... I hope you do want this.” 

 

Keith looked at the bag and then back at me. “What are you doing here?” Okay, that wasn’t precisely the response I was expecting after driving two fucking hours to get here. 

 

“I came to see you. I think it was obvious.” 

 

“Why would you do that?” Oh my god. What’s wrong with him? 

 

“Let me think... Maybe because you fucking disappeared without saying and a word and I got really worried?” 

 

Keith expression suddenly softened. “You were…  _ worried _ ?” He asked like he didn’t really believe it. 

 

“No, I was joking, that’s why I drove for two hours just to see you.” And I think I saw him blush at that, but he quickly turned around, so I guess I’ll never be sure. But it was a nice thought. 

 

“I guess you can come in, then.” 

 

I followed Keith inside and looked around. The walls of the room were painted in a bright red and let me say that it was the worst idea ever, it hurt my eyes. Why would anyone paint his room red? I would go crazy living here, how can you chill surrounded by this vibrant color? At least it was mostly covered by posters. I thought there would be emo bands posters all around. I wasn’t sure what kind of music he listened to but judging by his hair and dark clothes I guessed he listened to something like  _ My Chemical Romance _ . But to my surprise all the posters were about space, all showing constellations, planets, NASA’s logo and even a poster with a UFO with the text ‘I want to believe.' Nerd. 

 

We sat on his bed, and I offered Keith a cupcake. He gladly took, and I eyed the rest of the cupcakes lying inside the bag. 

 

“These are all yours, but can I have one?” Keith took a bite before answering me. 

 

“No.” Fucking rude. But if I took one after being said no to, Hunk would be very disappointed in me. So I frowned and nodded, which seemed to make Keith chuckle. 

 

“I was joking, take one.” 

 

I grinned and quickly took one, and it tasted delicious. 

 

I looked at Keith. I came all the way here so at least I should talk to him. 

 

“So… how are you doing?” Wasn’t there anything more basic than that? I’m stupid. 

 

“I just got expelled. How do you think I am?” I'm an idiot. 

 

“Right, sorry.” Come on, Lance, think of something nice to say. 

 

“Remember when you asked me why was I in astronomy class?” Keith looked at me confused but nodded. 

 

“Well, I have an answer now.” 

 

“Surprise me.” 

 

“To take you to space.” Oh shit. This sounded better in my head. Out loud I seemed like I was the protagonist from a cheesy movie. Keith snorted. I bet it sounded ridiculous to him as well. 

 

“Find another life goal; I’m planning on getting back to class. I’m sure Shiro will find a way for me to get in again.” The mention of Shiro instead of me helping Keith made me feel a bit jealous, feeling that made me annoyed. 

 

“Well, okay, I was just trying to cheer you up.” I said as I glared at him. 

 

Keith looked at me arching an eyebrow. “Telling me that you’ll achieve my life goal for me? That’s a lame way to cheer someone up.” 

 

I kept glaring and moved my head towards his in an attempt to be intimidating. “Excuse me? I’m the best at cheering people up.” 

 

He did the same as me, moving closer in order to be intimidating. Our foreheads touched, he was so fricking close. 

 

“Prove it then.” 

 

I frowned pushing against his forehead, saying what usually wasn’t supposed to be said in a defiant tone. “Do you want me to cheer you up, mullet?” 

 

“I dare you to try.” 

 

And what I did next was more focused on what my mess of emotions wanted instead of trying to cheer him up; I grabbed with force the back of Keith’s head pulling him even closer until our lips touched.

 

With my eyes suddenly shut, I tilted my head and slowly parted my lips. I slipped my tongue tasting Keith’s slightly chapped lips, which made his mouth open a bit allowing me access to explore the insides of his mouth. I ran my hand through his hair as I tilted my head the other way, Keith making similar awkward movements as his tongue fought with mine, pushing forward. I could tell he neither had kissed someone before and I was only imitating what I had seen in movies, and this was way different from it. This was messy, and I could feel some saliva dripping from our mouths, not sure whose was it. I moved my other hand to Keith’s face and stroke his cheek with my thumb at the same time I felt both of Keith’s hand gently grabbing my shoulders. 

 

What was happening right now was far from perfect and way more different from how I imagine my first kiss would be. Kissing a boy was never in my plans, even less kissing Keith but here I was. I liked this awkward and messy kiss. And I liked this grumpy and evil boy. And as I slowly moved my tongue back inside my mouth and gently bit Keith’s lower lip, I felt it; it was this weird feeling like if this exact moment had happened a thousand times in my dreams, like if I had been waiting my whole life for this moment.


	10. Stars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Omg there were so many comments in the last chapter and they were so nice :') Thanks a lot ❤

I pulled away from Keith still not quite believing what just happened. He was staring right back at me, his eyes slightly more open than the usual and his face was completely red. The color stood out so brightly against his pale skin that this time I was completely sure that he was blushing, and all because of me. His hair was more of a mess than the usual, probably because of my hand just a few seconds ago. And his mouth was still partially open, breathing through it like he suddenly forgot how to do it. He looked so vulnerable. I found myself breathing the exact same way and felt my face as hot as ever. 

 

We were staring at each other in silence, none of us knew what to say. But I simply didn't want to say anything, I only wanted to kiss him again, he was still so close, and I could do it right now, but I didn't. Keith blinked a couple of times to snap out of his shock. 

 

“I…” Keith let out only a word, like he couldn't find the words. 

 

My mind instantly decided to continue the sentence on his own.  _ I don't like you, Lance, why did you do that? _ Please don't say that. 

 

“I think… I think I proved it.” What is he talking about? Prove what?

 

_ “I won’t tell you until I prove something.”  _

 

I remembered Keith words from last week. What did he prove? He hasn’t done anything. Unless… he hasn't really proved anything. Who I thought was most probably Keith's soulmate was downstairs and Keith was only going to tell me who my soulmate was just to get rid of me because me kissing him wasn't supposed to happen. I suddenly didn't want to hear who my soulmate was if he wasn't going to say his own name.

 

Suddenly a sound of something shattering came from downstairs followed by Shiro's voice. 

 

“Keith! I fucked up!” 

 

Keith's expression instantly turned into a frown. He stood up and looked at me. 

 

“I'll be right back.” 

 

Keith immediately walked out of the room, and I didn't want to be here when he came back to tell me that he didn't like me and that I was stupid. So I stood up and quietly made my way downstairs, catching a glimpse of Keith and Shiro's conversation. 

 

“How can you…? What the fuck were you even doing?” 

 

“Shut up; I'm not the one who lit a toast on fire.” I actually could picture Keith doing that. 

 

“Oh you shut up we're not talking about that now.” 

 

I slowly opened the door that leads outside trying not to make a sound. But when I finally got outside the door slammed making the loudest sound ever. So I quickly ran to Hunk's car before Keith could come find me and drove away. I should really stop running away from my problems, but I wasn't prepared for this. I was now in too deep and wouldn't stand being rejected. I'll just hope that Keith won't be able to come back to class, as much of a prick I sound by saying that, and try to forget the warmth of his hand and his dry lips. I'm so stupid. 

 

But there was still something bugging my mind; if they're soulmates, why didn't they share a room if they live together? Why didn't Keith know how to kiss? Or was he just bad at it? Why did he even kissed back? Lance, stop thinking and focus on driving.

 

As soon as I arrived at the campus, I went straight to my room. I'll give Hunk back his keys tomorrow; I didn't really want to explain him what happened. I wasn't there for more than fifteen minutes, how could I had fucked up that bad in so little time. 

 

I sighed and laid down on my bed. I looked around to see if I had something to distract myself with and stop thinking about Keith. My eyes instantly locked on the book Keith and I took from the library the other night. It felt like the universe was mocking me. Suddenly there was knocking at my door. It was probably Hunk; he might have seen his car parked outside and got worried because I didn't go to him. As much as I love Hunk's hugs and kind words, I didn't want to talk about what happened. I felt too embarrassed about it, and sad, like if I just threw my most valuable possession down a cliff. So I pretended I wasn't here. But the knocking didn't cease, it only became louder, and it wouldn't stop. Was he really that worried? It was making me feel even more bad about myself, so I stood up and went to open the door.

 

Standing there in front of me was Keith, and I never saw him that angry. 

 

“What’s wrong with you?!”

 

Oh shit. I quickly tried to close the door, but Keith stopped it with his foot. 

 

“Don't you dare.” 

 

Did he really follow me all the way here? And he looked so pissed. 

 

“Why did you leave?!” 

 

His expression and his tone were so intimidating that I just stood there not knowing what to do. And I guess he noticed because he sighed and ran a hand through his hair. 

 

“I'm sorry. I didn't mean to shout. It happens sometimes.” Okay. Can he go now? I still couldn't close the door; his foot was ready to stop it. 

 

“Why did you leave so suddenly?” He asked again, calmer than before. 

 

I guess he wouldn't be going until I answer. I'll just say it in a rush and try to close the door again.

 

“You've been making me feel weird for quite a while, and I felt the urge to be with you all the time, and then you disappeared, and I felt sad and I found you and then you were so close and I couldn't stop myself and I just had to go because I know you don't like me back beca-” 

 

“Lance.” Don't interrupt me goddamit. 

 

“Because your soulmate was downstairs and I knew that, and I didn't know why I did what I did, well I knew why but I shouldn't have, and I got so scared that you-” 

 

“What are you talking about?” Let me finish! 

 

“That you'll reject me and hate me forever because I'm so stup-” 

 

Suddenly Keith's hand were grabbing both sides of my head pulling me close to him until our lips collided for the second time today. But this was different; it wasn't even a kiss, he just pulled our mouths together until they touched and then moved away a second after. 

 

“Quiet now?” 

 

“You don't know how to kiss.” I didn't really mean to say that out loud. But he just shrugged. 

 

“I guess you'll have to show me then.” What? I felt my whole face turning red at that. 

 

“What were you even talking about?” 

 

“Um, I was answering your question?” 

 

Keith rolled his eyes. “You were calling someone my soulmate.” 

 

“Yeah; Shiro.” 

 

He snorted. “My stepbrother?” 

 

“Stepwhat?” 

 

Wait. That meant Shiro was not Keith’s soulmate. Who was it then? I haven’t heard him talk about anyone else, yet he says he’d met him.

 

Keith walked into my room and sat on my bed. I closed the door and went to sit beside him. 

 

“I actually have something to tell you…” 

 

I nodded and waited for him to speak because I couldn’t be more confused. 

 

“I had liked you since… I don’t know… about a year ago? And I didn’t know how to deal with it, so maybe I tried to grab your attention in the wrong way, sorry about that… And during all that time I thought we weren’t even compatible and when I saw your soulmark the other day I-” 

 

“You recognized it as someone’s else’s and decided it was the end of it.” I finished the sentence for him; I didn’t want to listen to him saying that he was not my soulmate. 

 

“That’s not-” 

 

“Look, Keith, I think I maybe like you too… and I don’t care if we’re not soulmates, feelings are more important than a mark on the skin, right?” 

 

“But, Lance-” Now that I heard him saying that he liked me I had to fight for this. 

 

“No, no buts. You can tell whoever my soulmate is to go eat shit because you’re the one that I like. And I really do wish you were my soulmate, but we both know you aren’t, you would have told me by now if that was the case, I know you aren’t that stupid to have kept such an important thing from me…” 

 

Keith’s expression suddenly turned into something that looked like horror, why that reaction? I just said I liked him back, isn’t that what he wanted? He looked away from me. 

 

“Right… I wouldn’t do that…”

 

“Can I ask you something?” 

 

Keith looked at me again and nodded. 

 

“Your soulmate… you said you know him and that you’ll go to space with him, that sounded a lot like you like him…” 

 

“I lied. I never asked him to go to space with me.” 

 

“But you do know him?” Keith nodded slowly. 

 

“And… do you like him?” 

 

Keith looked away again and stayed silent. I could tell he was uncomfortable, that maybe was a bad sign. But if he was here, that meant that he had chosen me over his soulmate, right? 

 

“Sorry. I won’t say anything more about him. But can I ask you another question? Unrelated to him, of course.” 

 

Keith turned his head to look at me again. “Sure.” 

 

“You told me you wanted to prove something before you told me who my soulmate is. What was it?” 

 

Keith chuckled. “That you aren’t straight.” This idiot. 

 

“Wait. Does that mean that my soulmate is a boy? Wait. No. Don’t answer. He doesn’t matter.” 

 

Keith became silent again. Why was he being such a downer? I needed to do something.

 

I stood up and grabbed a pen from my desk. Then I walked back to Keith. 

 

“Give me your hand.” 

 

Keith looked at me confused but extended his arm anyway. I took his hand and drew a star on it then I drew one almost identical on mine. 

 

“Now we have matching marks. I’d say we’re officially soulmates. And they’re stars because that’s where we’re headed when we both finish studying, because you’ll come back to class, I’m sure of it.” 

 

I expected this to cheer him up, but he just stared at the star drawn on his hand with a sad expression. 

 

“I’m so sorry. Was that too much? Too cheesy? I can erase them and pretend I didn’t do that.” 

 

Keith shook his head. “Don’t worry, Lance. It was actually cute.” Keith smiled softly, but I still could tell that something was off. Wasn’t this supposed to be a happy moment? 


	11. Shut me up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope this chapter is good because I've been feeling kinda down these days and I don't know if it turned out okay so idk. Anyway thank you for your comments on the last chapter, you all are so nice ❤

We stayed in silence sitting on my bed. Movies lie. We confessed to each other, shouldn't we now be laying in bed saying cute things to one another? Maybe a kiss or two… But this was just so uncomfortable; I even wished that he smirked and teased me like he has been doing these past days. I didn't even picture Keith saying cute things to me. How did I even come to the point when I wished he did? I hated him not so long ago. I didn't even know that I liked boys.

 

I stared at him. He was looking down at his knees with a thoughtful expression. I wonder why he was like that now. Did I say something wrong? I noticed his hair was greasy and sticking into directions that they wouldn't normally, even though Keith's hair was always a mess. 

 

“Dude when was the last time you showered?” Great thing to say to break the silence, Lance. Just great. He looked at me. 

 

“Um… I'm not sure. I think it was when I took you for a run.” 

 

“That's disgusting.” 

 

Keith arched an eyebrow. “Excuse me? Not everyone can be a beauty king like you.” He spoke in a tone like if he was insulting me but I felt myself blushing at that. He called me a beauty king oh my god. 

 

“I'm flattered, but normal people shower regularly, you know? Personal hygiene and all that stuff?” 

 

“Oh, shut up.” 

 

I leaned closer to him and smirked. “Make me.” 

 

“I'm not sure if you’re asking me to kiss or to punch you.” 

 

“Why would I want you to punch me?!” 

 

Keith shrugged. “I don't know. You're weird; maybe you're into that.” 

 

I frowned and turned around crossing my arms. “I no longer want a kiss.” 

 

I heard Keith chuckle, and then he wrapped his arms around me pulling my back against his chest. I rested my head on his shoulder as his arms were still around me and I looked up at him. He looked down at me smirking and moved his head closer until our noses were touching. 

 

“Are you sure about that?” He was so close I could feel his warm breath all over my face. 

 

“Your breath smells bad.” Keith instantly moved his face away from mine. 

 

“Lance!” 

 

I chuckled, and he smiled a little as he shook his head. 

 

Then he looked into my eyes as he leaned closer again, his gaze was intense, even threatening. For a moment, I thought that he was angry at me, I swallowed as he moved even closer to me. He then tightened his arms around me as he licked his lips before covering my mouth with his. I immediately kissed back. I could still feel how chapped and badly taken care of his lips were even though he tried to hide it with saliva before reaching my mouth. He tentatively moved his tongue through my lips, and I opened my mouth letting a huge breath escape, that was the moment he pulled away.

 

“Well, that was better than the last one.” I teased, and he smiled looking away. 

 

“Oh shut up.” 

 

Keith laid down on my bed pulling me with him. That ended up with me laying on him, embraced by him. His arms around me made me feel so safe and warm, like a cold night at home wrapped in blankets. This moment was so nice and perfect that I wanted it to last forever. And I felt so happy with no other one that Keith, the guy I hated not so long ago, that I felt like I could wake up anytime now.

 

Keith’s phone buzzed, so he stopped embracing me and answered the text. 

 

“Shiro’s coming here if you don’t mind. I told him I was in your room.” 

 

I nodded. “Did he came with you?” 

 

“Yeah, he wanted to come here anyway to talk to the principal. I’m sure he found a way to convince him.” 

 

After that, he closed his arms around me again, and five minutes later there was a knock on the door. I sat up so Keith could stand up and go open the door.

 

Shiro didn’t enter the room; he just stood there smiling, I guess that was a good sign regarding Keith’s return to class. 

 

“Is everything alright now?” Shiro asked looking at us, and we both nodded. “Glad to hear that, it got me worried when you ran off like that.” 

 

“Sorry, I was nervous.” 

 

Shiro nodded smiling and then looked at Keith’s hand and then to mine. “What’s with those stars?” 

 

Keith didn’t make any effort to answer, so I did. “I drew us matching marks. Now we are soulmates.” 

 

Shiro looked confused. “What about your real marks?” 

 

“This is my real mark; I don’t care about the person linked to my other mark. I like Keith.” 

 

Shiro didn’t answer me and looked at Keith frowning. “Keith, please tell me this is a joke, and you actually have told him that-” 

 

“Cockroach!” Keith yelled as he pointed at Shiro’s feet. 

 

Shiro jumped a little making a high pitched sound that I would have never imagine coming from him. When Shiro realized there was no cockroach he glared at Keith. 

 

“False alarm, sorry, but we have to go talk to the principal and that stuff.” 

 

“But I’ve already-” 

 

Keith pushed Shiro further into the corridor. “Bye Lance!” 

 

Keith closed the door before I could even answer. That was the weirdest thing I’ve seen in awhile.   

 

I tried not to give much thought into Shiro looking angry at my explanation. Keith seemed to like me and to have chosen me over his soulmate. And my head wasn’t going to start denying reality now. And now that I think about it, Shiro left without saying if Keith was allowed to come back to class. I should have asked for Keith’s number, shit. But I guess he’ll find a way to let me know, right? Because we’re a thing now. I should go tell Hunk. Plus he also would want his keys back.

 

I went over to Hunk’s dorm and knocked on his door. A few seconds later Pidge opened the door. 

 

“Oh, Lance. Are you back from being gay with Keith?” 

 

“Hello to you too, Pidge.” I tried to enter Hunk’s room, but she stopped me, grinning. 

 

“Come on, tell me all the juicy details, was there a kiss?” 

 

“There wasn’t a kiss.” 

 

Pidge shook her head. “Don’t lie to me, Lance. I know everything.” 

 

“There wasn’t one. There were actually three. Well, the second one was weird, I don’t know if I could count that as a kiss…” 

 

Pidge’s eyes grew wide. “Wait. What?! Really?!” 

 

Thanks to Pidge’s surprise I could step inside Hunk’s room. But as soon as I got in, two big arms were wrapped around me pulling me into the air and swinging me around. 

 

“I knew you'd do it! I’m so proud of you, Lance!” 

 

I chuckled, and Hunk let me back on the floor. 

 

“Did he like the cupcakes?” 

 

“Of course who wouldn’t like your cupcakes?” 

 

Hunk sat on his bed and patted the spot next to him for me to sit there. “We made them together actually.” 

 

I sat down, and Pidge stood in front of us with her arms crossed pretending to be offended. 

 

“You two made cupcakes and didn’t give me a single one?” 

 

Hunk sighed. “They were for Keith, to cheer him up.” 

 

“You’re telling me that Lance’s newly acquired boyfriend gets food and I a lifelong friend like me doesn’t? This is disrespectful.”  

 

“Keith’s not my boyfriend! Well, actually I don’t know. We haven’t talked about it...” 

 

Pidge sat down next to me. 

 

“I still can’t believe that you spent all your time, at least since I know you, whining about how you’d met and who would be your soulmate and it turned out to be Keith of all people.” 

 

“Actually… Keith isn’t my soulmate.” 

 

Pidge looked confused. That didn’t happen much; I’ll treasure this moment. “What do you mean?” 

 

“That our marks don’t match, well I actually haven’t seen Keith’s mark. But whatever, who cares about marks if we like each other?” 

 

Pidge grinned. “You mean that you broke the believes that almost all the population holds onto, you included, which are clearly bullshit, because I mean, the thought that every person is made for another one, that they understand and connect with each other in every way and on every level, it’s simply unrealistic. And that you above all people, that seemed to truly believe in this stupid concept, suddenly realized that you can choose whoever you want to be with instead of just going by whatever a mark on your skin dictates, makes me feel so, so proud of you.” 

 

“I’m going to go by thank you.” 

 

Pidge smiled and nodded.

 

I showed Pidge my hand, the one in which I had drawn the star. “We decided to make our own marks, so now we’re soulmates, but we chose to be.” 

 

Pidge looked at my hand. “Okay, forget what I’ve said, that’s lame.” 

 

I gasped. “You’re lame!” 

 

Hunk grabbed me by the shoulder. “Come on guys, behave a little.” 

 

Pidge stuck her tongue out at me, and I frowned at her. 

 

Hunk spoke again trying to stop more mocking. “So, Lance, why don’t you tell us what happened? We want to know, right Pidge?” 

 

She shrugged. “I guess I’m kinda curious.” 

 

I grinned and began to narrate the events of today.

 

“I was determined to go and cheer up this emo kid. So like the man I am, I spent a two-hour journey filled with difficulties such as boredom and hunger until I reached the so long waited destination. I talked my way in with the half robotic and intimidating man that guarded the door and climbed my way suffering from terrible exhaustion to Keith’s chamber. There I found him lying on his bed in distress, but as soon as he saw me, his whole face lit up with happiness.  _ Oh, Lance, I’ve been waiting so long for your arrival _ . He spoke as he reached out for me. I took his hand in mine and gently kissed it, an action that caused Keith to dismay-.” 

 

“Lance!” Pidge interrupted me. “Tell us what truly happened.” 

  
“Okay, okay. Geez, you guys are no fun.” 


	12. Keith's room

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for your comments! And I wanted to say that I'll probably start taking a bit longer to update, but not so much though, maybe a couple more days than the usual or maybe not idk. I just have a lot of things to read for college and less time to write but I may end up procrastinating and write, so I'm saying this just in case

The next morning when I arrived at class all I could do was stare at Keith's empty seat hoping that everything was settled now. But he didn't come. I never even used to talk with Keith during class but his absence bothered me. I wonder when I'll see him again, I still don't have any means to contact him. Coran informed us that he still hasn't looked over all of our projects but that the ones he did look pretty good. And I swear he looked at me when he said that. I couldn’t wait to see the results and tell Keith. Wait. No. I couldn’t wait to see the results  _ with _ Keith in class.

 

When I finished all my lessons, I went back to my dorm to find no one else than Keith leaning on my door. 

 

“Hey.” I said as I got near him. He looked up from his phone and put it away. 

 

“Hey.” 

 

Should I kiss him? Maybe it was too soon to start greeting him with a kiss. But when would it stop being too early? You know what? Who cares? I leaned closer to Keith and quickly pecked his lips. I stared at him waiting for a reaction and he smiled a little like he was trying to hold the smile back. So cute.

 

“I have great news.” 

 

“What is it?” I opened my room and walked inside, followed by Keith, who closed the door behind him. 

 

“I’ll be back in class next week.” 

 

“Dude, that’s great. I knew you’d come back.” 

 

Keith smiled and nodded. “It was thanks to Shiro though.” 

 

“And you’re getting your room back too, right? Having my boyf- I mean you next door sounds nice right now.” Shit. I almost called him my boyfriend. What was I thinking? We haven’t established anything yet. Keith chuckled. 

 

“You can call me your boyfriend if you want.” I felt myself blushing at that. “But about the room thing… I’m only allowed to be on campus during class hours to ‘avoid late night incidents.’” 

 

“Oh… That means you’ll be driving two hours to get to class every day?” 

 

Keith shook his head. “Shiro had already thought about this beforehand, so he searched for an apartment near the campus, and we’re moving in today.” 

 

“He’s moving with you?” 

 

Keith nodded. “I can’t afford an apartment on my own. So he’s selling the other one and moving with me. But right now he’s at the old one packing his stuff. Do you want to see where I’ll leave?” 

 

“Oh, Keith, are you trying to get me alone so soon?” I smirked. 

 

“We’re literally alone in your room right now, dumbass.” 

 

“Oh. Right. Okay. Let’s go.”

 

Keith’s new apartment was ten minutes away from campus. It wasn’t as good as the room next door, but I could go with this. The place was mostly empty except for the furniture and a few boxes. I followed Keith upstairs to a room with only a bed, a desk, and a few shelves. The walls of it were painted white. 

 

“Please don’t paint the walls red.” 

 

Keith looked at me confused. “Why not? I like red.” 

 

“I know, but it’s a horrible color to paint a room with.” 

 

Keith crossed his arms. “What are you now? An art student?” 

 

“No. A person with common sense.” 

 

Keith arched an eyebrow. “Well, fuck you because I’m painting them red.” 

 

I gasped. “Then I won’t be coming to your room ever.” 

 

Keith laughed. “Even you don’t believe that.” That’s true, I’ll come here even if he paints his room with a fluorescent color, but he doesn’t need to know that. 

 

“I mean it. I won’t come.” 

 

Keith sighed. “What color do you suggest then?” 

 

“Blue.” 

 

Keith shook his head. “I don’t like blue.” 

 

“Blasphemy!” 

 

Keith completely ignored me and looked around his new room. “I think I’ll paint it after the best team ever.” 

 

“Wildcats?” 

 

Keith burst into laughter. “Team purple, you idiot.” 

 

I remembered that that’s what we called ourselves in laser tag and the thought of Keith painting his room with  _ our _ color seemed so cute to me that I felt myself blushing again. I quickly looked away.

 

“So… nice place.” I said as I sat on Keith’s bed. 

 

“Yeah. Would you help me unpack my stuff?” 

 

“Wow. So that’s why you brought me here? To work? No, mullet. I’m a guest here.” 

 

Keith didn’t seem bothered by my answer. He walked towards me and sat on my lap as he wrapped his arms around my neck. I looked at him, and he moved his face closer to mine until our foreheads were touching. I could feel his breath all over my face as he nearly brushed his lips with mine but moved away before the collision, making me move towards him like he had some kind of magnetic force pulling me until we were both standing up. He placed his hands on my shoulders stopping me from moving any closer to him and then he smirked. 

 

“What are you doing? Don’t do that.” 

 

“Don’t worry, Lance. I’ll let you kiss me.” 

 

With that, I tried to reach him again, but he stopped me. 

 

“I’ll let you kiss me after you help me unpack.” Fucker. 

 

“Ok gay.” 

 

He looked at me confused. “What?” 

 

“I said okay.” 

 

He looked at me in disbelief. “Okay…” 

 

“Yeah, that’s what I said.” 

 

He stared at me for a few seconds like he wanted to say something more but he turned around. “Follow me. I have some boxes downstairs.” 

 

I walked behind him, and he stopped in front of two boxes. He picked one up, and I picked up the other one. Then we went back to his room. I watched him open his box and start to place some books on the shelves. I opened the box I had to look at what it had inside. Clothes. I guess this goes in the closet. I moved the box near the closet; I’ll classify the clothes by colors to make it easier to Keith. I glanced at the clothes. Well, maybe not by colors but by grayscale plus a special space for red clothes. 

 

“Why do you have to be so emo?” 

 

Keith stopped unpacking his stuff just to glare at me but didn’t say anything.

 

I finished placing Keith’s shirts, then his trousers and after those, I reached his underwear. I blushed for the third time today as I stared down at Keith’s boxers. I glanced at Keith to see if he was aware of my situation, but he seemed busy. Okay, it was just clothes, I have these too, I don’t know why I’m making such a big deal out of this. 

 

I started to carefully place Keith’s underwear inside the closet until I saw them. I picked them up and unfolded them to get a full view of them. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Keith had  _ Power Rangers _ underwear. I started laughing, and Keith looked at me confused. 

 

“What’s so funny?” 

 

I held up the boxers for him to see. Keith’s eyes went wide as he blushed deeply. He then ran towards me and tried to take them away from me. 

 

“Give me that!” 

 

I moved my hand as far from Keith as I could, but he was able to grab them somehow. But I wasn’t going to let go. 

 

“Come on. At least let me take a picture of them.” 

 

“No!” 

 

Keith kept trying to take his boxers away from me when we heard the door downstairs, followed by Shiro’s voice. 

 

“Keith! I’m home!” 

 

We both let go of the boxers in surprise, and they flew out through the door. Then we heard Shiro’s voice again. 

 

“And I’m leaving! You two have fun and stay safe!” We both blushed realizing what Shiro thought. 

 

Keith instantly ran downstairs. 

 

“Shiro! Wait! It’s not that!” 

 

But Shiro had already left. I don’t think I could ever look at Shiro again after this. Keith went back upstairs and glared at me. But I couldn’t take him seriously because he was still blushing a little. 

 

“Look what you’ve done!” 

 

“What I’ve done? This is your fault!” 

 

Keith arched an eyebrow. “How is this my fault? You’re the one who took them!” 

 

“Well, you are the one who bought those boxers in the first place!” 

 

Keith blinked and looked at me as if I was stupid. “Why do I even like you?”

 

Keith walked to his bed and sat down. I followed him and sat down next to him smirking. 

 

“You said you like me.” 

 

Keith looked at me. “I thought you already knew that.” 

 

“I suppose… but it’s nice to hear.” 

 

Keith smiled and placed a soft kiss on the top of my head. Oh my god, he was so cute. 

 

“You truly are my soulmate, even if we don’t have matching marks to prove it.” 

 

Keith looked away like if what I said somehow pained him. I guess he really wishes we were soulmates. I looked at his hand and noticed that the star I drew yesterday was still on his hand. 

 

“Please, don’t tell me you still haven’t showered.” 

 

“Um… Alright, I won’t tell you.” 

 

I stood up and pulled him up too. 

 

“What are you doing?” 

 

I grabbed him by the shoulders and pushed him out of the room. “You’re a disgusting little man.” 

 

I looked around and spotted the bathroom. I pushed Keith towards it until he was inside. 

 

“You’re not getting out of there until you’re showered and clean.” 

 

“Who do you think you are?” 

 

I closed the bathroom door and went back to Keith’s room. I decided to look over some of the books Keith had placed on the shelves to pass the time. I picked the first one up and read the title;  _ Alien Conspiracy: Unraveling the UFO/Alien Mystery _ . Nerd. I’m not reading this. I put the book back in its place and laid down on the bed. Then I felt the urge to use the toilet. 

 

I went downstairs to see if there was another bathroom in the house but there wasn’t. I went back upstairs and knocked on the bathroom door. 

 

“Keith, cover up, I need to use the toilet.” 

 

I waited a few seconds to give Keith time and then I opened the door.

 

Keith was standing there looking at me with a horrified expression wearing no more than a towel to cover up his lower body. And I guess that any other time I would be more flustered than ever at this sight but there was no room for that in my head. I even forgot why I entered the bathroom in the first place. Because all my attention was focused on the mirror on the wall, which reflected Keith’s back.


	13. The tree

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for your nice comments ❤

I was staring at Keith’s back in the mirror; I bet he thought that if he faced me, I wouldn’t see it. But I could perfectly see his soulmark, that flame drawn in the back of his body, exactly like mine. I had wished for this to be true, and now it only angered me, sadden me. Because there was the problem; he faced me thinking that wouldn’t see it, meaning that he didn’t want me to see it. Why? 

 

He knew it from the very beginning, from the very first day when I went to the pool, and he came to give me back my glasses, he saw it, he saw my mark, and he knew, that’s why that day he was staring at me like that. And he did not tell me. He said that he knew who had the same mark as me but didn’t seem to speak about himself. Maybe it was because he didn’t like the idea at that moment because he seemed to hate me. 

 

Even though he told me that he liked me and that he was only mean to grab my attention. If that was the truth, why wouldn't he tell me? Why keep it secret even when we were boyfriends? Because he doesn’t like me or he isn’t sure he likes me. I chose to be with someone even though I believed he wasn’t my soulmate, the same way Keith can choose not to be with his soulmate, with me. 

 

He kissed me and told me I could call him  _ my boyfriend _ . At the same time, he didn’t tell me we were soulmates. He was trying me, seeing if I could be a good partner. He was playing with me, and it made me sick. And if he didn’t want me as his soulmate, then I didn’t want him either.

 

Keith noticed me staring at something behind him without saying anything and quickly looked there, noticing the mirror and eventually realizing what I saw. He looked at me with panic in his eyes. 

 

“Lance, listen I can explain.” 

 

“Fuck you.” 

 

I don’t think there was any explanation coming from his mouth that didn’t include that he didn’t like me or that he wasn’t sure he did or that he didn’t really want anything serious with me. 

 

And I knew I couldn’t be able to handle hearing any of that from Keith. So the best thing to do right now was go away and try to stay away from Keith, something that will be quite difficult when he comes back to class next week, but I’ll try. I knew that if I heard those words from Keith, I’d break down, so I’d rather live without knowing the exact answer.

 

I turned around and stormed out towards the front door, hearing Keith’s hurried steps behind me. When I reached the door and opened it, Keith grabbed me by the shoulder. “Please, Lance listen to me. Please.” He looked so sad and terrified that for a moment I wanted to stay and listen to whatever he had to say as I held him in my arms. But I knew better. I pushed his hand away from me. “Leave me alone. I won’t let you play with my feelings anymore.” 

 

“Please, I’m begging you. Listen to me.” 

 

He looked so desperate, and his eyes were starting to get watery, and for some reason, it was the saddest yet most beautiful sight. This was something I hadn’t noticed before we got close, but Keith was without any doubt the most beautiful person I’ve ever laid eyes on. And I just wanted to kiss him, just one last kiss goodbye, but I shouldn’t and I wouldn’t. 

 

“And don’t follow me, you’re not even wearing clothes.” 

 

With that I went outside, too afraid to look back and the sight of Keith making me want to come back to him. I didn’t listen to any steps behind me, so he wasn’t following me. But if there was one thing I knew, it was that Keith was a hothead, so as soon as he got dressed, he’d probably go searching for me. With that in mind, I couldn’t go to my room, that was the first place he’d go searching for me, and I knew exactly the place where I’d go.

 

I made my way to a forest that was approximately twenty minutes walking away from campus. I usually went there when I failed an exam or missed my family. There was a spot next to the river, hidden in the trees where there was absolutely no one. 

 

I sat there, by the river, watching the water flow. I moved aside the rock that I used to hide a hole. There I had some pieces paper and a pen. And every time I took them out I knew it was a stupid thing to do. But when I am feeling down, I always write in a paper whatever was bothering me and leave it inside a hole in a tree. 

 

Every time I did this, when I came back the next time, the paper was gone. I knew it was probably someone that cleaned up the forest but imagining someone reading them comforted me for some reason. Even if I never got an answer, every time I wrote my worries down I felt instantly better. So I took a piece of paper and began to write.

 

I wrote down everything from the beginning until now. How Keith seemed to hate me and even stole my glasses the very day he discovered we were soulmates and didn’t bother to tell me. Instead of telling me he decided to play games on me, luring me towards him. Then when he noticed I started to like him as he had planned; he played along. 

 

The only thing that bothered me was how real his warmth and kisses felt.The way he blushed sometimes and the way he spoke. I’d love nothing more than hold onto this, but I couldn’t find any good reason for him not to tell me the truth. 

 

Keith is a fucking idiot.

 

I left the note inside the hole in the tree, but I didn’t feel any better. All I wanted to do was shout all these things to Keith’s face, but at the same time, I didn’t want to see his pretty face ever again. With all these confusing feelings inside me, I punched the tree. Not hard enough to break my hand but hard enough to scratch my knuckles and see some blood pouring from them. I examined my hand, and it didn’t seem too bad. I hope no one will notice it, especially Hunk; he is the last person I want to worry.

 

I put my hand in the river to clean the blood, and my knuckles burned at the touch of the cold water. It hurt more than the punch itself. I took a tissue from my pocket and wrapped it around my hand. At least this whole incident helped me not to think about Keith for a few minutes, and to release some of my anger.

 

I was about to sit down and relax a little when I heard a noise as some bushes moved. And that was definitely not the wind. I looked at the bush from a distance scared to get close to it, but it didn’t move again. And I was sure there was probably some wild animal in it, I mean, plants can’t move by themselves. 

 

I looked around, as I expected no one was there to see if I got attacked by some animal. So I slowly walked away, following the river as well as not losing sight of the bush. When I no longer could see it, I walked more calmly. 

 

I watched as some little fish jumped above the water avoiding every rock that went in their way. The view plus the sound of the river made quite a relaxing walk. 

 

The river led me to an open field filled with people. Everyone was in different groups with two people or more. And I was there, alone, staring from the woods like a creep. My eyes landed on a couple that seemed to be having a picnic. They looked at each other like there was no one else around and the thought of imagining Keith and I like that made me sick. I was in too deep for a prick.

 

I decided to turn around and go back to my dorm. It was getting late so I didn’t think Keith would be waiting there when I arrive. I followed the same path I took before, next to the river. When I passed by my usual spot, I glanced at the bush, but something else caught my attention. There was an arrow drawn with rocks on the floor. And it was pointing to the tree where I left the note earlier. 

 

I carefully walked towards the tree looking all around me in case there was someone nearby. I introduced my hand inside the hole and took out the paper. This wasn’t the paper I had written earlier. The sun was already setting, so I put the paper in my pocket and started to walk towards my dorm, I’ll read it there.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was supposed to be a little bit longer, but I decided to leave the ending I had prepared for this for the next chapter.


	14. Sorry

The walk to my dorm was lonely, and all my anger was gone by now, replaced by sadness. I kinda wished that Keith would come searching for me when I stormed out of his house. But he didn’t. I guess he didn’t care enough; he had already proved that.

 

I walked to my room, and I would lie if I said I wasn’t hoping that Keith was there waiting for me to come. But he wasn’t.

 

I entered my room and crashed on the bed, staring at the ceiling. It smelled like Keith. I rolled to my side and tried to concentrate on not thinking about him. As the left side of my body touched the bed, something in my pocket made a sound. That’s when I remembered the paper I found inside the tree. I took it out and began to read.

 

_Lance, please if you’re not going to listen to me at least read this. You can do whatever you want after you read it. You can throw it away and don’t talk to me again. And I’ll respect that and won’t try to talk to you unless you do decide to speak to me. But please, don’t go without letting me explain myself._

 

Was this Keith? How did he know I was in that forest? Did he follow me? And does this meant he read my letter? The one where I explained how pissed I felt about what he did. It probably hurt him, but he deserved it.

 

I pressed the note against my chest and closed my eyes. I didn’t know if I was ready for this, to read apologies for making me believe we could be together. I could just throw it away. He wouldn’t know about it. But I also felt curious about it. And maybe if I got an answer that proved my thoughts, it would be much easier to hate him and not miss him.

 

I sighed and sat up on my bed as I opened my eyes again. I tried to prepare myself for the wave of pain I probably had coming and focused on what Keith wrote.

 

_I know you hate me right now and I understand why. I read what you wrote about me, and I get why you were thinking all those things._

 

_When you left my house, I knew you would come here. Right now I am about to sound like a creep and give you another reason to hate me. But since you probably won’t speak to me again I guess I should say it._

 

_I like to go on walks in that forest; I’ve been doing it for quite a while. And always where there aren’t many people around. That’s how I found your secret place. I saw you writing and then leaving it there. And I couldn’t help my curiosity and read it. Then I came back whenever I could and read every single thing you wrote. All your worries your insecurities, your bad days… I know about your friends, your family, the beach… And I think that reading your most profound thoughts was what made me fall for you. I wanted to do something about it, something to cheer you up. But I was scared you stopped writing if you found out I was reading them and I was addicted to knowing about you. I know an apology isn’t enough for this, I know I shouldn’t have read all those letters and I’m so sorry. I’ll stop, I promise._

 

That’s why the letters disappeared! Oh god, of all people it had to be Keith reading them. There I wrote things that I didn’t even tell Hunk. And… he fell for me because of those things I wrote? I can’t understand why, most of them were really depressing... But anyway, I totally won’t be leaving any notes in the open again.

_But as you know this wasn’t what I wanted to talk about. I’ll start by saying, that I do like you, Lance. I like you a lot. I didn’t pretend a single thing._

 

_When I saw your soulmark that day at the pool, I felt so happy and scared at the same time. I knew it wasn’t a good idea to tell you right away, you may think I should had, but you hated me back then. You even thought you were straight. How was I supposed to deal with that?_

 

_So what I did was try to get close to you and do ‘evil things’ as you called them to grab your attention hoping it would make you feel at least interested in me. And I would admit I had fun with it; you sometimes looked so flustered and cute. It did work, but I guess I took it too far._

 

_That day, when you kissed me after I told you that Shiro was not my soulmate as you believed, I was about to tell you. But then you said that there was no way you were my soulmate because it would have been so wrong and stupid not to tell you before. And you were right; I should have told you right when I felt that you didn’t hate me anymore and I got scared._

 

_I am stupid, yes. I knew that the longer I waited, the worse it would be, but I was scared. I can't even say how sorry I am. And you have all the right to hate me._

 

_I hope you find someone better than me._

 

The letter wasn't signed. But it was now pretty clear that Keith had written it. This wasn't what I was expecting from Keith's explanation. There were no _I don't like you_ s or no _I'm sorry I was only playing with you_. It was just what seemed like a sincere apology and the explanation of a foolish mistake. But it did seem that he meant no harm, and I don't know how to feel about it.

 

I mean, he’s partly right. If that the day at the pool, when he saw my soulmark, if he had told me at that moment that he was my soulmate, I would probably have thought that he was making fun of me. And if he did prove it by showing me his mark or something I’d probably just run away from him and stop believing in the whole soulmate thing.

 

Funny if you think that either way Keith had made me stop believing it. But it was because I like him so much that I didn’t care he wasn’t my soulmate. And now… he really is my soulmate.

 

What he did was wrong, he should have told me. But at the same time, it wasn’t as bad as what I imagined. Should I forgive him? I surely don’t like what he did, but wasn’t this what I wanted?

 

Maybe I should talk to Hunk.

 

I took the note and put it in my pocket. Then I went over to Hunk’s room hoping he was not asleep yet. I wouldn’t want to wake him up because of this. He opened the door right after I knocked. He wasn’t wearing his pyjamas yet, right timing I guess.

 

“Hey, buddy, what’s up?”  

 

Before I could even answer, he pulled me into a hug and spoke again.

 

“What’s wrong, Lance?” He moved away from me and placed his hands on my shoulders as he looked at my eyes. “You look troubled, tell me.”

 

I stepped into his room and closed the door behind me. I followed Hunk to his bed, and we both sat there.

 

“It’s Keith. He’s my soulmate.”

 

“Are you worried about not having matching marks? You said it yourself, Lance, if you-”

 

I shook my head and interrupted Hunk. “No. He really is my soulmate. We do have matching marks.”

 

Hunk suddenly looked extremely confused. “What?”

 

“He didn’t tell me. I found out we had the same soulmark today. But it was an accident that I saw it.”

 

Hunk stayed silent, and I could tell from the look on his face that he was trying to find something comforting to say or a reason for Keith to do that. So I decided to show him what Keith had written. I took the note out of my pocket and handed it to him.

 

“I wouldn’t listen to his explanations, so he wrote me this instead.”

 

Hunk nodded and took the note. “Is it okay for me to read this?”

 

I nodded. “I need your help; I don’t know what to do. That is his explanation.”

 

Hunk unfolded the piece of paper and began to read in silence.

 

When he finished, he looked at me.

 

“And what do you think about it?”

 

I shrugged. “I mean, is not as bad as I thought in the first place, but he should have told me. What do you think I should do?”

 

“I’m not going to tell you what to do, Lance. This is your relationship, and I have no word in it. You should do what you think it’s right.”

 

“But I don’t know what’s right! I’m very confused right now.”

 

Hunk sighed. “You said that you didn’t want to listen to his explanation, why did you read the note then?”

 

“I guess, that if I read his horrible excuse, it would make it easier to hate him and not talk to him again…”

 

Hunk smirked. “And why did you want to hate him?”

 

“Because I like him…”

 

“Do you think he did this with any bad intention?”

 

I shook my head.

 

“And do you think he is sorry for this?”

 

“He seemed like it.”

 

Hunk smiled. “And you like him.”

 

“A lot.”

 

Hunk stood up. “Then I don’t know why you’re asking me if you already know what to do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... the next chapter will probably be the last. I say probably because depending on how I write it I maybe split it into two, but you should count only on one more. I already had planned the whole story beforehand, and it ends soon so yup.
> 
> And unrelated to this fic (stop reading this now if you want) I started writing the other fic I talked about in the last chapter's notes, so if anyone is interested, here's the [link](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12499128/chapters/28456816). ❤


	15. In flames

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... this is the final chapter, I hope it doesn't dissapoint or anything.

I still didn't have Keith's phone number or anything to contact him. So I couldn't let him know I read what he wrote and that I still wanted to be with him. But I did know where he lived. I made a mental note to go visiting tomorrow after class.

 

The morning passed quite slow. At least talking with Hunk helped me distract myself a little. But I didn't tell him I was planning on going to Keith's house today. I'm sure his cheering would make me even more nervous.

 

When I arrived at my room, I ate some lasagna leftovers Hunk had given to me today. After eating I spent five solid minutes looking in the mirror making sure I looked decent. I changed my clothes. Five more minutes in front of the mirror and I went outside.

 

The walk to Keith's house felt like the two-hour long car ride to his older one. When I arrived there, I stood in front of the house without approaching. I didn't even know what to say to him. _ I read your letter, apologies accepted _ . That didn't sound right. I should have thought about what to say beforehand. I stared at the house for a few minutes and wished Keith would go out for something or even looked through the window and noticed me. If that happened, I would be forced to try to talk to him. I even wished Shiro was the one to see me and told me to come inside. But none of those happened. I turned around and headed back to the campus.

 

The going to Keith's house and standing there like a creep only to turn around happened two more times during the week and made me feel even more stupid. But knowing that he would be back in class next week made me feel somehow better. If I saw him, it would make it easier to go talk to him, right?

 

The rest of the week passed by and I spent my free days hiding in my room. I was constantly nervous and wasn't really in the mood to go out with Hunk and Pidge. Thing I really should have done, staying at home overthinking and missing Keith didn't make me any good. 

 

Today was the day that Keith would be back and I felt like my heart would pop out of my chest at any moment with how fast it was going. I didn't expect him to be in the classroom when I arrived knowing that he always was late. But he was there, and I felt like fainting. He was in his usual seat but unlike always back then, he was looking down. He didn't smirk at me, he didn't look at me, not even when I walked right next to him and I felt like crying.

 

_ And won’t try to talk to you unless you do decide to speak to me. _

 

“You still haven't talked to him?” 

 

I looked down not even knowing what reason give to Hunk for being this stupid. He took my silence as an answer and knew that he shouldn't speak to me about it. I stared at Keith every single minute of the morning. 

 

When it was time to leave Keith took much longer than the usual to gather his stuff. I thought of going to talk to him, but I chickened out. Why was I so stupid?

 

The next day yesterday repeated itself. Keith didn't look at me a single time, and as I stared at him, I felt Hunk's worried gaze on me. And of course, I didn't talk to him.

 

The day after that Keith didn't come to class. Thing that made me feel even worse. Coran made me stay after the lesson ended and telling me it was okay to skip the rest of the day if I was feeling bad. I surely had to look bad for Coran to tell me that. But I did what he told me.

 

When I arrived at my room, I tried to take a nap to try and relax. Keith popping out in my mind every two seconds didn't help, but I still managed to fall asleep.

 

Later that day I was woken up by knocking on my door. It was probably Hunk worried about me, so I stayed in bed. He knocked again and then again. And I knew he wasn't going to leave, so I stood up and opened the door. It was Shiro.

 

“Um... Hey?”

 

“Lance.” Shiro said as he stepped into my room. Of course, I let him in. He looked a bit stressed. “Listen. About Keith. He's an idiot sometimes, and he makes some… questionable choices but I promise you he is a really great guy. What he did was unforgivable, but it was because-” He was sputtering and with his gaze lost somewhere behind me. I could tell he memorized all that, or at least he rehearsed his words before coming here. Anyway, I interrupted him.

 

“I know. He explained it in a letter.” 

 

Shiro stopped talking and looked at me with a surprised look. With a glimpse of fear in his eyes. “So you read that and still don't want to give him another chance? I mean I understand but he tried his best, he's not really good with words you know. And I've been with him almost all my life, and I can tell that he really likes you.” 

 

“That’s not it. I actually do. But… I don't know how.”

 

Shiro looked relieved at that and looked at me with a genuine smile adorning his face. “You don't have to give much thought to it, Lance. Just say how you feel about it even if you simply say  _ Keith I still want to be with you _ . That’ll do. If two people want to be together, they don't need to make everything so complicated.”

 

I slowly nodded. “I guess you're right… Did Keith tell you to come here?”

 

Shiro grinned. “He actually forbade me to come here. But if he wasn't going to do anything; I had to. He was being so whiny and unbearable.” 

 

I nodded. Was that why Keith didn't come to class today? Because he was sad? Because of me?

 

“Want to accompany me back to my house?”

 

The ride to Keith's house with Shiro was quiet and a bit uncomfortable. At least it was a short ride. When we entered the house, Shiro handed me a bag of cookies. 

 

“Give him this. He wanted cookies. He's probably in his room.”

 

I nodded and went upstairs. The door to Keith's room was open, and he was indeed inside. He was laying face down on his bed with all his limbs extended like if he was a starfish. I could tell it was difficult for him to breathe like that. And people say I’m a drama queen...

 

“Shiro told me to give you this.” Great starter, Lance.

 

Keith quickly sat up with a jump and stared at me like he was seeing a ghost. Since he didn't say anything, I slowly walked towards him and offered him the bag. He looked at the bag and then at me.

 

“Did… Did Shiro forced you to come here?”

 

“Um… He didn't force me, I was planning on talking to you anyway.”

 

He started at me for a few seconds like he was processing what I've just said. “Does that mean that you forgive me?” 

 

“I'm not sure. I don't like what you did, but I guess I would have been scared in your place too. Either way, I still want to be with you. I… I really like you, Keith.”

 

Keith looked at me like he was about to cry. It was a weird sight on him. “Can I kiss you?”

 

I couldn't help a soft smile escaping my lips. With that puppy eyes and that innocent question. He was too cute. 

 

I extended my free hand at him to help him get up, and he smiled widely as he took my hand. His lips pressed against mine for such a short amount of time that it couldn’t ever be considered a kiss. But it was enough for both of us, just being close again.

 

“Why did we have to make everything so complicated?”

 

Keith looked at me and shrugged smiling softly. “I guess that’s just who we are.”

 

“We’re complicated?”

 

Keith nodded. “I thought that was obvious. We act way to different, but we both get too heavy into anything. When I discovered that I had a crush on you, I was almost hundred percent sure that something like us would never work. And when I saw your soulmark I knew this would end in flames.”

 

I opened my eyes widely holding back a laugh. “Did you just make a pun? Like end in flames? We both have a flame as a soulmark.”

 

“What?! I did not! You are the one that makes terrible puns! It was a metaphorical sentence meaning that we would-”

 

I interrupted him. “Pun. It was definitely a pun.”

 

Keith rolled his eyes letting out a groan. I chuckled and after leaving the bag of cookies on Keith’s desk I pushed him until he was laying on the bed. I laid on top of him and pressed our foreheads together.

 

“Well, I like punny Keith.” 

 

After that, I leaned down and pecked his lips. When I opened my eyes to look at him, he was staring right back at me with a wide smile and blushing face.

 

“It may have been a pun.”

 

* * *

 

 

We got the highest mark in the whole class in our project. 

I was banned from the library for a month after losing the book Keith and I stole the night Keith got expelled. The truth was it was safely stored in my room because it turned out to be really interesting and reminded me of Keith due to it being his favorite book. 

Keith started to hang out more and more with Pidge and Hunk, with Shiro joining us sometimes. Keith turned out quite close to Pidge, although they mostly bonded by plotting pranks against me. I guess Keith was still into evil stuff.

Keith eventually got better at kissing because we genuinely ‘practiced’ a lot. He would tell me cute things every now and then, mixing in between some of his evil things that somehow still made me flustered.

Even though Keith still got on my nerves from time to time and the fact that he would steal my glasses whenever we argued about stupid things, I was grateful that somehow within all the people who lived, I got linked to the greatest boy in the whole world.

“What you thinking about?” 

“I was just remembering how I ended up with the best soulmate ever.”

“Lucky you, I got the dumbest one.”

“Keith!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone that read all of this and to all the people that commented through all of this and aaa I'm just so wow I didn't expect this many people reading this. And well thank you again ❤❤❤❤❤ Every single one of your comments made me so happy and they boosted me to continue writing this (this is the first one I actually finish writing so). I'm really looking forward to your opinions on this last one ❤
> 
> And I don't actually post anything related to my writing on tumblr but if anyone wants to talk to me about voltron or something idk, I'll leave it [here.](http://paulapolarwhite.tumblr.com/)


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